In the current digital era, there are many Qibla direction applications circulating on various sites and digital content services throughout the world. These applications usually utilize a magnetic compass, Global Positioning System (GPS), and other technologies in determining Qibla direction. Most recently, there are now many applications that can determine the direction of a place or a game that utilizes Augmented Reality technology that combines two-dimensional and or three-dimensional virtual objects into a three-dimensional real environment and then projects these virtual objects in a real environment. This made the writer interested in creating an android application for determining Qibla direction using Augmented Reality technology combined with methods for determining Qibla direction in Indonesia.
Referring to the background above, the writer then formulates several problems. First, how is the Qibla direction determination algorithm using an android application with Augmented Reality technology in the AR Qibla Finder application. Second, how is the accuracy of determining the Qibla direction using an android application with Augmented Reality technology in the AR Qibla Finder application.
The type of research that the authors take is research development or Research and Development, with the digitalization model of astronomy. Namely creating an android application for determining Qibla direction with Augmented Reality technology called AR Qibla Finder. The results of this study are that the calculation method used by the AR Qibla Finder application is the Vincenty formula, which is quite accurate in its calculations (7 minutes difference from the calculation of the Istiwa'aini Qibla direction) because the Vincenty formula has high accuracy in determining the Qibla direction based on the ellipsoid shape of the earth. Then, determining the Qibla direction using the 3D Qibla feature with augmented reality technology is categorized as quite accurate according to the level of accuracy of Slamet Hambali and still within tolerance limits according to the level of accuracy of Thomas Djamaluddin. The accuracy of the Qibla direction of the AR Qibla Finder application differs from 0o to 1o from the Qibla direction measured by Istiwa’aini and Rashdul Qiblah.