How Prague’s National Museum Designed Markerless AR Around a Fin Whale

The National Museum in Prague, the largest museum in the Czech Republic, has taken a bold step into the future with the launch of a mobile application designed to transform the visitor experience. Adam Cironis, Head of Information Systems and Digitisation, detailed the innovative process of creating augmented reality (AR) features to enhance engagement with one of the museum’s most iconic exhibits: the fin whale.

For museum professionals, this project offers a blueprint for leveraging AR to create immersive and educational experiences. Here’s how the National Museum brought this vision to life and the key takeaways for institutions looking to adopt similar technology.

Seamless Augmented Reality: A Visitor-Centred Approach

The museum team’s priority was to make AR both accessible and non-intrusive. “It was very important for us to not require any specific action from the user,” Adam explained. “No markers, no cumbersome setups—you simply aim your phone, and the whale comes alive.”

This decision was driven by two key considerations:

• Preserving Space Integrity: Avoiding visible markers like QR codes ensured the AR experience didn’t detract from the historic beauty of the museum.
• Ease of Use: A markerless solution lowered the barrier to entry for visitors, ensuring a seamless and intuitive interaction with the technology.

The result was an AR experience that felt natural and magical, enhancing the storytelling potential of the museum without disrupting its visual aesthetics.

Fit the feature into the visitor app

As part of a broader modernisation effort following the museum’s reconstruction (2012-2018), the mobile application integrates several features to enhance the visitor experience:

1. Personalised Audio Guides: With over 800 educational programmes conducted annually, the museum recognised the need for scalable, high-quality interpretive tools. The app provides detailed audio guides tailored to exhibitions, offering an on-demand alternative to group tours.
2. Indoor Navigation: Leveraging over 1,000 Bluetooth beacons, the app helps visitors find specific exhibits, restrooms, cafés, and more. This feature addresses a common challenge in large museums: wayfinding.
3. Queue-Free Ticketing: High weekend visitor numbers (over 7,000 daily) make pre-purchased tickets essential. The app streamlines entry, improving the overall visitor flow and satisfaction.
4. Augmented Reality: The AR feature serves as the standout innovation, enabling visitors to interact with exhibits like the fin whale in ways that were previously unimaginable.

Anchor AR without visual clutter

Markerless AR technology was key to the project’s success, and museum professionals can draw valuable insights from the challenges faced and solutions implemented:

• Avoiding Visual Clutter: Large markers or QR codes would have detracted from the museum’s atmosphere. Markerless technology maintained the room’s integrity and enhanced visitor immersion.
• Focusing on Intuitive Design: Visitors can activate AR simply by pointing their phones, ensuring the technology doesn’t feel like a barrier but rather an enhancement.

To achieve this, the team utilised persistent AR technology, combining Google Cloud anchors and 3D scanning tools to precisely integrate digital content into the physical environment.

Impact and Visitor Engagement

The AR-enhanced fin whale has been a significant hit, particularly with younger visitors who delight in the interactive virtual fish swimming around the exhibit. This playful element complements the museum’s educational mission, sparking curiosity and deeper engagement with the exhibit.

Adam shared a light-hearted observation: “The fun fact is that you actually can’t catch the fish—but don’t tell the kids that!”

For museum professionals, this demonstrates how AR can blend education with entertainment to captivate audiences of all ages. Importantly, the project aligns with the broader goal of making cultural heritage accessible and engaging for a diverse audience.

Looking Ahead: Expanding AR in Museums

The success of the fin whale project has inspired the National Museum to develop additional AR experiences for other exhibits. This forward-thinking approach highlights the potential of AR to transform visitor engagement across the sector.

Adam Cironis described a clear constraint for the fin whale experience: visitors should not need a visible marker in the historic gallery to activate the digital content. The team used persistent anchoring and scanning to place the experience within the room. AR also sits inside a broader museum app alongside navigation, audio interpretation and ticketing. For museums considering the same approach, the useful distinction is between making an AR feature easy to activate and helping visitors discover and obtain the app that contains it.

For a related case study, see gallery prompts for Chroma AR.
Museum professionals visiting Prague are encouraged to explore the National Museum’s app, experience the fin whale AR feature, and draw inspiration for their own institutions. By embracing innovative solutions like AR, museums can not only preserve cultural heritage but also reimagine how it is shared with the world.