Spatial UX
Spatial Heatmap
A spatial heatmap is a heatmap rendered inside a 3D scene, colour-coding density of presence, attention or interaction across surfaces and volumes.
Spatial heatmaps replace the flattened 2D heatmaps used in web analytics. They support fixed environments, variable layouts, targeted A/B changes and issue-focused overlays — each answering a different XR research question.
Gossip Analytics produces four canonical spatial heatmap types: presence (where users spent time), attention (where users looked), interaction (where users acted) and friction (where users hesitated or repeated). Combining them is what turns a heatmap from a marketing image into an actionable diagnostic.
Why it matters
Spatial heatmaps compress hundreds of sessions into one image that a product manager, a designer, an accessibility researcher and a stakeholder can all read in seconds. They shorten decision cycles because they replace 'we think users struggled here' with 'here is where they struggled, at what density, on which layout'.
Example
An immersive museum experience compares two lighting configurations side-by-side. The attention heatmap shows visitors in variant A concentrate on three exhibits and skip the fourth; in variant B, the fourth becomes the most-viewed. The team ships variant B and documents the decision with the heatmap pair.