Apple Reportedly Gives Up on Next-Gen Apple Vision Pro Headset
Hindsight Is 20/20
Apple is reportedly giving up on the next generation of its uber-expensive Vision Pro headset.
The unwieldy gadget went on sale for an eye-searing $3,499 earlier this year and was met with mixed reviews.
By April, Bloomberg reported that consumers had largely stopped booking demos to try the device out at stores, with sales going "from a couple of units a day to just a handful in a whole week."
Now, according to new reporting from The Information, the tech giant has suspended work on the next Vision Pro and is looking for ways to cut costs for a cheaper model that could ship by the end of next year.
It's an unfortunate, albeit unsurprising new development for Apple's foray into the VR space. The device, while lauded for its industry-leading visual fidelity, has quickly turned into a dust magnet, suffering from an underbaked software ecosystem and a design that makes it uncomfortable to wear for prolonged periods of time.
Cutting Costs
There's a lot we still don't know about Apple's cheaper Vision headset. According to The Information, the company is hoping to keep the same displays but make it "at least one-third lighter" and bring the price in line with a high-end iPhone.
It's also still unclear if Apple will meet its own 2025 deadline, as it's struggled to lower costs without cutting too many corners.
As for the existing Vision Pro, the company is still hoping to roll out the headset internationally by the end of this month. The company has also teased new features included in the second iteration of the device's operating system at its Worldwide Developers Conference last week.
But whether those efforts will turn things around for an extremely expensive device with surprisingly few use cases remains to be seen.
In other words, prioritizing cost-cutting measures may just keep Apple's VR hopes and dreams alive.
More on the headset: Almost Nobody Is Buying Apple's Super Expensive Vision Pro VR Headset
