Meta unveils Quest 3 VR headset, launching this fall for $499.99

June 2, 2023 – This week, Mark Zuckerberg introduced Meta’s next-generation digital and blended actuality headset – the Meta Quest 3, which launches later this 12 months. In line with Meta, it options increased decision, stronger efficiency, breakthrough Meta Actuality expertise, and a slimmer, extra snug kind issue.

With an announcement from Apple relating to an XR gadget seeming extraordinarily possible within the coming days, it appears as if Meta is attempting to dampen the fanfare of any potential announcement, and likewise possible place itself as probably the most reasonably priced choice for customers to enter the digital and blended actuality (VR/MR) house.

Quest 3 will ship in all nations the place Meta Quest is at present supported this fall. The 128GB headset begins at USD $499.99, and the corporate is providing a further storage choice for customers who need some further house. Meta famous that it’s going to have heaps extra to share at its Meta Join occasion, which returns this 12 months on September 27.

Meta’s Most Highly effective Headset But

Meta acknowledged that the brand new Quest 3 gadget will mix the corporate’s highest decision show but and pancake optics. To energy the additional pixels, this would be the first headset to function a next-generation Snapdragon chipset developed in collaboration with Qualcomm Applied sciences. This next-gen Snapdragon chipset will ship greater than twice the graphical efficiency because the earlier era Snapdragon GPU in Quest 2, which is at present powered by Qualcomm’s XR2 chipset. Once more, Meta famous that extra particulars on the chipset that’s powering Quest 3 will probably be unveiled later this 12 months.

Immersive VR + Meta Actuality expertise on Quest 3

On Quest 3, Meta Actuality expertise will permit for the seamless mixing of the bodily and digital worlds. In line with Meta, new experiences on the gadget will “transcend at this time’s blended actuality by intelligently understanding and responding to things in a consumer’s bodily house” and can permit customers to navigate that house in pure, intuitive ways in which had been practically unattainable earlier than.

Excessive-fidelity colour Passthrough, machine studying, and spatial understanding let customers work together with digital content material and the bodily world concurrently, creating limitless prospects to discover.

The Quest 3 will apparently function twin 4MP RGB colour cameras, a depth sensor for a extra correct illustration of the play house, and 10x extra pixels in Passthrough in comparison with the Quest 2 gadget.

Meta acknowledged in its announcement: “In different phrases: Quest 3 is our first mass-market providing to ship each cutting-edge VR and MR experiences in a single gadget, setting a brand new benchmark for future headsets.”

The corporate’s VP of VR, Mark Rabkin, commented: “In the end, our imaginative and prescient is to allow you to maneuver by way of all realities in a means that’s intuitive and pleasant, going past the inflexible classifications of ‘digital actuality’ and ‘blended actuality’ to ship really next-gen experiences that allow you to effortlessly mix the bodily and digital worlds. Meta Actuality provides you each the deep, immersive magic of VR and the liberty and delight of creating your bodily world extra enjoyable and helpful with MR.”

Design

With a 40% slimmer optic profile* in comparison with Quest 2, Quest 3 is a sleeker, extra snug headset. Meta has additionally fully redesigned Quest 3’s Contact Plus controllers with a extra streamlined and ergonomic kind issue. Due to the corporate’s advances in monitoring expertise, Meta has dropped the outer monitoring rings so the controllers really feel like a extra pure extension of a consumer’s fingers and take up much less house.

Meta has additionally included TruTouch haptics that first debuted in Contact Professional. Customers may also improve to Meta’s absolutely self-tracked Meta Quest Contact Professional Controllers for a premium expertise.Hand monitoring may also be supported out of the field, permitting customers to discover with out controllers, because of the gadget’s Direct Contact expertise.

Content material

The Quest 3 is backwards appropriate with the Quest 2 catalog of over 500 VR video games, apps, and experiences, and Meta acknowledged that it has much more new VR and MR titles lined up for launch. 

What about Quest 2?

As for the Meta Quest 2 headset, it’s nonetheless at present one of the reasonably priced methods to get into VR, and beginning June 4, the value of the gadget will probably be reducing simply USD $299.99 for the 128GB SKU and USD $349.99 for the 256GB SKU.

In an upcoming software program replace, the corporate may also be updating the Quest 2 and Quest Professional GPU and CPU. Quest 2 and Professional will see an up-to 26% CPU efficiency enhance with an up-to 19% GPU velocity enhance for Quest 2 and 11% for Quest Professional, in response to Meta. The corporate famous that the replace ought to end in smoother gameplay, a extra responsive UI, and richer content material on each headsets. Plus, the corporate is enabling Dynamic Decision Scaling for each Quest 2 and Quest Professional, so video games and apps can reap the benefits of elevated pixel density with out dropping frames.

Meta closed its announcement by acknowledged that whereas the brand new Quest 3 will set a brand new customary for blended actuality, immersive gaming, and what a mainstream VR headset will be, Quest 2 will stay the corporate’s most reasonably priced entry level to VR, and the Quest Professional is optimized for work use circumstances, with face and eye monitoring for extra genuine self-expression in conferences. The Quest 2 and Quest Professional units will in consequence proceed to be offered alongside Quest 3 when it’s launched, and new software program updates will proceed to be shipped to make the Quest expertise even higher.

For extra info on the Quest 3, click on here. 

Picture / video credit score: Meta / YouTube

Sam Sprigg

Sam is the Founder and Managing Editor of Auganix. With a background in analysis and report writing, he has been masking XR trade information for the previous 5 years.