This was also posted on one of the best niche subs, r/cinematography.
Here is that thread [0], with mostly professional takes. One interesting take-away:
> I’ve pre-ordered one. Vision Pro sales will be around 1/2M at the one year mark, and there’s a total of about 3 hours of immersive content available on the headset across every app right now.
> That’s a once in a lifetime content opportunity.
Or it could be the next 3D video, a gimmick that peaks and fades away quickly among the mass market.
If you ask me, the Vision Pro’s sales up to this point justify discontinuation. I think that Apple is only making investments in Vision Pro because they don’t really have another long play for “the next great device form factor,” and because Meta hasn’t thrown in the towel yet Apple presumably refuses to sit back while Meta dominates marketshare for a specific type of app platform.
I think that Apple and everyone else is very aware that VR/AR is more likely than not be close to the maximum user base. Meta’s been doing everything it can to make the platform stay within impulse buy territory because they know it’s not really a purchase that potential customers are going to seriously believe that they’ll spend hours and hours every day using like a traditional game console or PC graphics card. Meta has to convince you to buy a device that they must certainly know from their own telemetry that users only interact with for a handful of hours every week.
The only reason Apple is sticking with it is that it’s a long term play and they have unlimited money. Or maybe because they refuse to give up until Meta gives up. They can’t let Meta own a computing platform out of pure business ego.
I believe that the cinematographer who I was quoting has much more short-term practical goals.
What he might be thinking is that there are 400k to 500k people who have already spent $3500 on a device which currently has no content. If he got 10% of them to "spend" $2 on his short immersive video experience, that would cover the cost of the camera + shoot + profit, in his first successful attempt.
You could also say those stats show there is no market. How many owners are even MAU anymore? Most VR headsets collect dust after the initial wow phase passes and you run out of content.
How much are you spending on marketing to reach those users?
However, the reason that I put "spend" in scare quotes was that it might be the case the these indie immersive content creators get their content subsided, or bought outright, by either Apple or some content app maker.
source: 100% supposition by someone who has never owned a VR headset.
I hope he finds what he's looking for. We've been fumbling about to find a visual language that really clicks for VR storytelling. It feels like there ought to be one, and if he can find it, it can be as huge as moving pictures.
As it is right now it feels like those early days of film, which seem incredibly awkward because they didn't know how to use it to tell a story. But they were clearly casting about for something they knew was there. It just took a while to find.
Of course, you can watch it in a higher pixel per inch on a conventional TV, which can be shared with everyone in the room, for half the price (assuming a high end OLED).
If people didn’t buy into 3D TVs which have the advantage of being able to be shared within a room, nobody in significant numbers is going to buy an expensive isolating 3D experience just to get an amazing cinema experience.
And let’s not forget that cinephiles can get a 4D movie experience for twenty bucks at their local theater. I saw Dune in 4DX and the way the ornithopter shook my seat and moved it around and blew wind in my face was really cool. Can’t get that with a $3500 Vision Pro!
The pixels per inch on a TV vs. Vision are a wash, in my experience.
Technically they are better on the TV in terms of density, but the greater brightness, control of surrounding light, and clarity and (always!) perfect focus of the virtual screen in the eye-screens has its own benefits. Especially when in a surrounding night scene.
> I saw Dune in 4DX and the way the ornithopter shook my seat and moved it around and blew wind in my face was really cool. Can’t get that with a $3500 Vision Pro!
Sounds really great. Maybe not yet, but perhaps something that could be done with linked home theatre furniture - sign me up!
But don't knock being "in" the movie (as a result of my customization recommendations)!
Another not obvious benefit is that by moving the virtual screen "closer" and "farther", you can line up the artificial "depth" of the stereo vision with distance in a way that clicks at the right distance and feels much more real. You can't do that with a physical screen.
> nobody in significant numbers is going to buy an expensive isolating 3D experience just to get an amazing cinema experience
Vision Pro, based on its name, its pricing, its marketing, the state of the OS/ecosystem at launch, and so on and so forth was never meant to "sell well". It is an early entrance and closer to a devkit than a typical apple consumer product. This was universally acknowledged (as far as anything is universally acknowledged) from the get go.
It seems like that you could have made the conclusion that it should be discontinued before it went on the market if "poor sales" justifies that for this device.
"Everybody" wanted the first generation of iphone despite it being grossly deficient in numerous ways (OS/ecosystem, hardware, price, etc), even compared to the extant smartphones / blackberries of it's time. People overlooked all of those deficiencies because the premise of a smartphone that was one big capacitive touch screen was extremely compelling.
With the Vision Pro, that kind of enthusiasm just isn't there. If it was going to be the next big thing, there would be a lot of hype for it even though its rough around the edges. The general public isn't rejecting the Vision Pro because it costs too much and has no apps, they're rejecting it because wearing a computer on their face isn't something they're interested in.
Most people I know are in fact rejecting it due to cost, and have instead settled for a Q3. You can get a second hand car here for what they want for a Vision Pro. It’s too much even for the hardcore Apple fans I know for an unknown, hell, I’m into VR and have been for longer than I can remember now, I have the disposable income and it’s STILL to much, even for me.
Telling on myself but almost everyone I know plays games/works in IT. Yes, I am a man child surrounded by man children/women children I suppose.
All up at least 10 current active VR users. Usage scale ranges from “an experience 3-4 times a year” to “years of daily active usage.”
Another mate joined just recently who is not really into gaming, but got a quest because he actually wanted a big tv/projector but it’s not feasible living in shared housing. I actually told him not to, I just didn’t think he would enjoy it, and despite enjoying jt myself, I actually don’t promote it much to people I consider “normies”because I know it’s niche and I don’t think it really is for most people, but interestingly he has been really happy with it entirely for movies.
Doubly crushing for Apple given it sold worse than their low expectations, they shut the production manufacturing and cut sales expectations from 800k to 400k.
Back in the era of Palm Pilots and Blackberries, most people didn't have one, but the people who did have one tended to use them extensively every day. Today, most people don't have VR headsets, and most of the people who do are letting them collect dust on a shelf in their closet.
In the first case you have a type of product that is evidently very useful but isn't ready for the general public. In the second case, you have a product that early adopters can't find a routine use for.
There have been VR headsets since before there were PDAs. The first VR Headsets were made in the 80s by VPL (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VPL_Research). This no where near being a new idea, this is a forty year old idea that gets a resurgence every 5 to 10 years then everyone remembers why it never caught on the last item. It is a niche consumer peripheral, but it has a lot of applications in professions such as Architecture, Engineering, Medicine, Aerospace, and Training. But those industries can probably only support one or two small manufacturers.
Agreed. There’s a lot of variables (and I think price is a big one). But, while slow, adoption in enterprise is showing signs that the basic concept has some legs. Even if the tech today needs some time to marinate.
That said I also don’t think we’re are a time-local maxima of users either.
I’m basing this on reports that it has not crossed the million unit sales number. Possibly just barely crossing the 500,000 mark right about now.
These are sales that are on par with the Nintendo Virtual Boy.
And if they can’t manufacture any more than that, they have an even bigger problem.
It’s now been a year and a half since the first model was announced and there is no sign of a second model to move the product into a more mass appeal device.
We saw critical follow-ups like the iPhone 3G and Apple Watch Series 1/2 come out as quick releases that were in retrospect very important to establishing a practical device that a regular person might consider buying. I think the fact that we haven’t seen one yet is a huge problem.
If Apple couldn’t make another leap in a calendar year it’s clear that they will never catch up to Meta. Meta is out there selling a gazillion Quest 3S bundles to your local Costco impulse buyer.
I suspect your expectations for sales are much loftier than Apple’s.
The million sales mark was from one single report by Kuo. Kuo himself previously said they were limited to ~900K display units which is ~450K devices and other analysts have said the same.
There is no other source saying 1M was the target that I know of that doesn’t trace back to Kuo. If they are at ~500K units then they’ve exceeded the initial sales target that Kuo himself laid out.
For your second point about a follow up, you’re comparing product announcement to product launches. The product itself only launched 10months ago. You’re expecting a second iteration within 10 months, of an entirely new product class for them ? Meanwhile other more popular Apple products often go longer between releases. Even Meta are around two years between products within a device class.
Your last point of comparing to a meta quest is misplaced too. They’re different classes of the same device category. There’s no way Apple are expecting to compete with a device a tenth of its price for total sales.
It really wasn't something where I was looking to follow anyone else's sales expectations, it's something where I see a consumer product from Apple selling less than 1 million units and I see a failure. (It's really not even a Mac Pro-like product that is an ecosystem and professional strategy play, it's truly just a content consumption device at its core more similar to an iPad).
You're right that the Meta Quest is a different class of the same device category. But that's the problem, isn't it? Apple made a device that is in a different class of the same device category, really far away in a price point where just aren't any customers.
That's why Apple actually needed an unusually fast follow-up device, because the first product was too close to being an overpriced barely-working tech demo, similar to the original iPhone and Apple Watch.
I think it is quite safe for us to all assume that Apple isn't releasing a Vision Pro follow-up in the next couple of months. The iPhone 3G dropped the price and outclassed the original iPhone owners so much that Steve Jobs had to write an apology letter. The Apple Watch released a new product that resolved all the gripes from the first one in 12 months. I just think as a business strategy that Apple is missing the mark here with the Vision Pro.
To your last point, you’re confusing the iPhone 3G and the original iPhone. The original iPhone was the one that had a price drop after launch which included the apology response, not the iPhone 3G.
To the rest of your point, I’m sure Apple is aware that there aren’t a lot of customers at the 3500 dollar mark. They’ve said as much in interviews, but you’d have to attribute a lot of hubris to them to think they thought they’d steal market share from the Quest line.
Again, all reports say they can’t even manufacture enough right now to be more than a blip on the sales chart.
Perhaps your first paragraph bellies your confusion because you claim it’s just a consumption device, and partly that’s because apples marketing focuses on it, because it’s the easiest thing to communicate.
The 3500 price tag is exactly the starting price point of other high end XR headsets that are used in many non-consumption areas. I say starting, because they go up considerably from there (see the Varjo XR prices). That’s the space where it’s not consumption, but work. It’s the same way that a Mac Pro can be used to view Netflix the same way a MacBook Air can, and they have similar capabilities on paper but widely different markets to target.
From all accounts of working with those industries, Apple has eaten that market share. Varjo has stopped being the headset of choice for most of those cases, to the point that even NVIDIA (who were a huge Varjo customer) are doing Vision Pro courses at siggraph and made it the headset they feature for professional work ( https://resources.nvidia.com/en-us-awe-2024/omniverse-apple-... )
Basically, don’t take Apple’s consumer facing marketing as their entire sales pitch. They have completely separate paths for businesses.
None of this is to say that there aren’t areas that Apple has missed on with the headset. There clearly are several, but I don’t think sales strategy is actually one of them. Marketing is perhaps an issue though.
If all you care about is gaming, perhaps. But there’s a lot of areas where the Vision Pro is a better product to the point where the price difference is irrelevant. Much like professional cameras aren’t actually 10x the features of prosumer cameras, yet command a higher price because of what they enable at the high end.
Industrial and medical use, creative platforms etc,
Literally the only other headsets I can use for the lines of work I’m involved with are 4x the price of the Vision Pro (the Varjo XRs), yet by your metric wouldn’t be worthwhile.
And this is the problem with people who don’t consider usecases beyond their own.
So Apple, the company that doesn't sell an enterprise cloud computing platform and doesn't sell a business productivity suite wants to sell the Vision Pro to specialized industries?
Excuse me for being very skeptical.
I don't see a whole lot of Apple marketing material talking about the Vision Pro as a professional device. They have a grand total of one press release that highlights different uses for business. There's no landing page that says "contact sales" or anything like that you'd see for an enterprisey specialized solution.
In my mind the more plausible explanation is that Apple misjudged the pricing strategy for the Vision Pro, a device that it considers to be primarily a consumer content device.
If the Vision Pro was a $1000 product they would have potentially had a hit. But I think what's going to happen is that Apple is going to have a product like that in 2026 and when it comes out the response is going to be quite muted.
Just because Apples consumer marketing pages don’t target enterprise, doesn’t mean they don’t target enterprise as a product. See the Mac Pro webpage that also doesn’t mention enterprise contacts https://www.apple.com/mac-pro/ but it’s clearly not targeted for just consumers either.
I'm sorry do any actual surgeons or airline techs use these apps? I would be very skeptical that it's used in any kind of sizable number (or that it's even allowed in surgery, frankly).
Yes they are. Here are articles and videos for surgery use. Previously, the HoloLens was used for the surgery market and the Vision Pro has largely replaced it.
That's impressive, but it is currently not licensed for use in surgeries. The first article mentions that they can only use it through an IRB-approved study that all patients have the right to opt-out of.
But yeah, if Apple can become a medical device company, it would unlock a huge revenue stream for them. Looks like these people are optimistic, I'll take them at their word for that.
I personally don't know if Apple is willing to put the investment into the devices to make them viable as medical devices. There is a reason medical devices have huge costs, and that's largely because of the human effort involved to go multiple rounds with the FDA and other regulatory bodies to get a device approved for use in medical facilities outside of trials and studies.
To note, the items used in surgery don’t all need to be medically certified for use if they’re not involved in the interaction with the person being operated on. They just need to adhere to certain standards and maintenance.
This is why you’ll often see a range of display devices in operating theatres. You’ll even see iPads or other tablets that aren’t necessarily certified for use.
As a daily user of Apple Vision Pro, I can see the value of creating a much cheaper non-pro version.
But I could also see the value of a comparably priced or even higher priced version, with ultra versions of their M chips, going all in as a Mac or MacBook upgrade in terms of user interface.
I use mine as a MacBook Pro screen upgrade. I would love to dispense with the MacBook, while retaining Mac level (as apposition to limited iOS style) applications.
> Industrial and medical use, creative platforms etc, Literally the only other headsets I can use for the lines of work I’m involved with are 4x the price of the Vision Pro (the Varjo XRs), yet by your metric wouldn’t be worthwhile
But the AVP cannot be used for any of these use cases, and as far as I know is not in serious use for professionals in such industries at scale, so why are you acting as if I was blind to the real reason people buy it? None of those are reasons people would buy it today.
Also, you seem to not be aware that the Quest series actually have a professional / industrial business sales setup and do actually make large volumes of sales for business use cases, unlike AVP (https://forwork.meta.com/quest/business-subscription/)
The reason I think you’re not counting those is because you claim equivalency of capability despite cost difference, but there’s clear areas that I know of where a Quest would not cut it.
Your link to metas business use has no relation to my argument. I’m not saying the quest can’t be used for business cases, because I myself have set up professional environments around it. But that’s why I’m confident in saying the Vision Pro allows for a level of fidelity that the Quest cannot provide for today.
> * think that Apple and everyone else is very aware that VR/AR is more likely than not be close to the maximum user base.*
Maybe for current device clunkiness and capabilities.
I expect that would change if it could do a good job of replacing desk screens, or let people spend their commute staring at a hud instead of staring at a phone.
Everyone is trying to do that, but the tech just isn't there yet. We would need to double the resolution of the best VR headsets to be able to properly simulate 1920p screens at any reasonable distance.
But at the same time everyone knows that the tech will get there eventually. A lot of current VR products seem to mostly exist to position companies to be able to exploit the market once the tech gets good enough.
People made money off 3D thanks to 3D cinemas. 3D glasses are cheap, often disposable. VR headsets are expensive and clunky, I doubt we're going to see VR cinemas with comparable capacity.
Here is that thread [0], with mostly professional takes. One interesting take-away:
> I’ve pre-ordered one. Vision Pro sales will be around 1/2M at the one year mark, and there’s a total of about 3 hours of immersive content available on the headset across every app right now.
> That’s a once in a lifetime content opportunity.
[0] https://old.reddit.com/r/cinematography/comments/1hhvwfv/bla...