hands

The hands component enables full hand tracking interaction in AR scenes using A-Frame and WebXR. It supports both left and right hands and allows detection of gestures, including pointing and pinch interactions, as well as triggering click events on interactive elements.

Example

Below is an example showing how to use the hands component in a scene. Try this demo with hand tracking enabled AR hardware (e.g., Meta Quest Pro).

import 'spatial-design-system/components/autoXr.js';
import 'spatial-design-system/components/hands.js';
import 'spatial-design-system/components/finger-touch.js';
import 'spatial-design-system/primitives/ar-button.js';

<a-scene auto-xr>
  <!-- This line enables hand tracking for both hands -->
  <a-entity id="rig" hands> </a-entity>

  <!-- This button shows how to add interactive component to the scene -->
  <a-ar-button
    finger-touch
    position="0 1.5 -0.5"
    content="Button"
    primary="#018A6C"
    textcolor="white"
    size="large"
  ></a-ar-button>
</a-scene>

Props

Property	Type	Default	Description
leftEnabled	boolean	true	Whether to create and track the left hand
rightEnabled	boolean	true	Whether to create and track the right hand
leftHandColor	color	#edccb6	Color for the left hand model
rightHandColor	color	#edccb6	Color for the right hand model

Events

The hands component emits the following custom events:

Pinch gesture events (global)

These events are emitted to the whole scene, so it can be used to detect pinch gestures on all entities in the scene.

Event	Parameters	Description
hand-pinch-started	{ hand, handId: "left" | "right", pinchPointWorld: { x: number, y: number, z: number } }	Emitted when a pinch gesture begins.
hand-pinch-moved	{ hand, handId: "left" | "right", pinchPointWorld: { x: number, y: number, z: number } }	Emitted continuously while a pinch gesture moves.
hand-pinch-ended	{ hand, handId: "left" | "right" }	Emitted when a pinch gesture ends.

Hover collision events (object-level)

These events are emitted directly to the target element.

Event	Parameters	Description
hand-hover-started	{ hand: HTMLElement, side: "left" | "right" }	Emitted when a hand starts hovering over an object.
hand-hover-ended	{ hand: HTMLElement, side: "left" | "right" }	Emitted when a hand stops hovering over an object.

Usage Tips

Using the component on mobile devices

Mobile WebXR currently does not support hand-tracking. So you are not able to detect hand gestures on mobile devices.

However, you can still interact with UI elements by using the standard A-Frame cursor:

<a-camera>
  <a-cursor></a-cursor>
</a-camera>

When using a cursor:

• The cursor behaves like a virtual pointer in the center of the screen.
• Interactive components such as ar-button, vr-interactive, or entities with interactable will respond to cursor events.
• Interactions are triggered by tapping the screen.

Limitations

• Objects must use components that supports hands gestures (e.g., finger-touch, hands-hoverable, grabbable, stretchable).
• This component relies on the hand-tracking-controls and hand-tracking-grab-controls provided by A-Frame.
• To use this component, your XR device must support hand-tracking (e.g., Meta Quest). It is not supported in mobile browsers.
• Objects must have proper bounding boxes for collision detection to work reliably.