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Oculus Go to hit the market very soon

The Oculus Go is expected to cost only 199 dollars in the US

Unveiled in the fall of 2017, the Oculus Go Virtual Reality headset is expected to finally hit the market with an initial launch in the US in May, Variety reports. It's thought that Facebook will officially announce the launch and reveal new compatible content at its F8 developer conference, to be held on May 1-2 in San José, California.

Mark Zuckerberg is betting that in the very near future close to one billion people -- half of all Facebook users - will adopt VR. And his product of choice is the Oculus Go. Much less expensive than the pioneering Oculus Rift, the cordless Oculus Go doesn't require a PC or a smartphone to function as it has its own LCD screen and a processor enabling it to transmit images via a Wi-Fi network. The Oculus GO has to be sold with a controller.

Chinese company Xiaomi manufactures the headset, which includes a Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor. Facebook hopes that with a price tag of $199, sales will skyrocket and the use of this type of headset will become commonplace.

The Oculus Go is setting itself up as an alternative to the various headsets developed by Asus, Dell, HP and Lenovo in collaboration with Microsoft, all of which are compatible with the Windows Mixed Reality platform. Microsoft has already announced around a hundred apps that are ready to go, as well as a major partnership with Valve Software and its Steam VR platform providing access to a slew of high-quality immersive games.

Aside from the technology offered by the Oculus Go and its intrinsic technical quality, the content offering will be a key differentiating factor. Facebook is likely to stand out from its competitors in this respect, helped by its huge community of users.