In the recent years, we have seen the use of beacons to help people with vision impairment navigate their immediate surroundings. Some prominent examples can be seen at London’s busy Euston station, and city of Strasbourg in France. Beacons are placed everywhere at a physical location like an office, shopping mall, bus or train station, and interact with an app on the phone. The user tells the app where they want to go, which in turn gets direction, and other related information from beacons placed everywhere. This makes it easy for people with visual impairment to get from one place to another in a very fluid manner.

Beacons can be used with vending machines also so blind people could hear descriptions of objects inside them. If a blind person walks past a room or facility, and they don’t know what it is, they can press a button on the app that will get description of the room from the beacon placed in the vicinity.

To get a better understanding of how beacons work, and to see them in action, watch the video below.

Source: ABC7 News