From the outside, it looks like virtual and mixed reality is having a moment. Three new headsets have launched or been announced in the last month: There’s Apple’s M5 Vision Pro, the Samsung Galaxy XR, and, just this week, Valve announced the Steam Frame. Given the marketing, you might assume that means Big Tech thinks this tech finally has some mass-market appeal. But, in the nearly 60 years since the first VR headset, one thing remains true: This isn’t the next iPhone.
“Let’s put it this way,” says Tuong Huy Nguyen, a director analyst on Gartner’s emerging technologies and trends team. “Everyone who wants a VR headset already has one.”
It’s not a question of if people are buying these headsets. They are — just not in numbers that signal the tech is ready for prime time. According to IDC, Apple shipped roughly 400,000 Vision Pro headsets in 2024. That makes sense, given the $3,500 price tag. But Meta’s headsets are relatively affordable at $300 to $500 and make for popular Christmas gifts. Meta shipped roughly 5.6 million headsets in 2024. Comparatively, 1.2 billion smartphones were shipped during the same time frame.
And despite what might look like hype around the Vision Pro and the Galaxy XR, Counterpoint Research senior analyst Flora Tang said that premium headsets, or those that cost more than $1,000, will represent just 5 to 6 percent of total VR shipments in 2025. That aligns with IDC’s numbers, which estimate that these premium headsets will account for roughly 6.2 percent of the total market in 2024.
But for such a small market, Big Tech continues to bet big that this is the future. Meta’s Reality Labs, the segment behind its Quest headsets and Ray-Ban smart glasses, just posted an operating loss of $4.4 billion on $470 million in sales during its third quarter.
So the real question is who is buying these headsets? And why are they so compelling to the biggest names in tech?
A stepping stone to smart glasses
Long story short: Headsets are a bit of a red herring. These bulky devices aren’t really the end goal. Instead, it’s sleek, discreet smart glasses that let you meld the real world with the digital.
Just look at Meta. It poured billions over several years into headsets, before graduating to audio-only smart glasses with cameras in 2021. Then, last month, it launched the Meta Ray-Ban Display, its first glasses with a heads-up display. This is the same roadmap that Google, Samsung, and Apple are currently on. But while companies work on refining sleek, wearable glasses, they have to simultaneously invest in headsets to build out the software.
“Eventually, we all know we want to get to the glasses, but it’s just going to be a while until we get there,” says Jitesh Ubrani, IDC’s research manager for mobile worldwide device trackers, referring to the dream of Tony Stark-like smart glasses with all the computing capabilities of XR headsets.
“The headset is a form factor that’s sort of here for now, and in the future, maybe gamers will use it. It’s here for a flash in the pan so we can get to the thing that we actually want.”
So who’s buying headsets?
While the average person wants a finished product, stepping stones are absolutely the purview of enterprises.
“The largest portion of Apple Vision Pro headsets actually went to developers and businesses. They’re the ones trying to create new experiences,” says IDC’s Ubrani. “What we saw for Vision Pro, and I strongly suspect we’ll see the same for Galaxy XR, is it’s essentially priced out of consumers’ hands. And the consumers who do want an XR experience have much cheaper options available.”
If you’re paying with your own dollars, a gadget needs to do as many things as possible. With a corporate budget, there’s more flexibility for cutting-edge devices that do perhaps one or two things well.
“In the short and mid-term, what we need and what will get adopted is purpose-built devices,” says Nguyen, the Gartner analyst. “Before today’s smartphones, it was PDAs and BlackBerrys. Very purpose-built if you’re a business person who needs your emails, or something like that. That’s where we are today.”
The numbers don’t lie, either. IDC says Apple may have only shipped 400,000 Vision Pros in 2024, but it held 30 percent of the enterprise market, second only to Meta at 47 percent.
Likewise, the overwhelming majority of Vision Pro owners The Verge spoke with were independent XR developers or enterprise users. Most had paid for the devices out of their own pocket.
All had a longtime interest in this space, with many either owning or having previously owned Quest headsets. Many had dabbled or were interested in experimenting with Samsung’s Galaxy XR. (Unsurprisingly, price was the biggest barrier there.) Most enjoyed immersive content and passthrough capabilities, and a handful had an interest in gaming. But the most common use case for every single analyst and headset owner I talked to?
Making jobs that need lots of big screens easier.
“I’m a programmer, so I like having a large workspace. If I have to code on a small screen, having multiple windows open — it feels very cramped. The goal for me was always to replace screens and my laptop is one of them. I’d be very happy if in the future I have no TV, no computer, like no screens in my home,” says Jacob Fiset, an XR enthusiast and Vision Pro owner.
Fiset doesn’t use a Mac, but has figured out a way to connect his PC to the headset using open-source software. He mostly uses his Vision Pro at the office, though he acknowledges that he’s alone in doing so.
David Larose, chief information officer of Drancy, a suburb of Paris, France, is currently tinkering with the Vision Pro to create more private CCTV screens. “Sometimes, police or secret service needs access to our cameras but we don’t have space or extra TVs to give them. My idea is to allow them to have their own totally private CCTV wall without using our physical one,” Larose says.
Headsets like the Vision Pro or Galaxy XR could change how hospitals train new doctors and update outdated infrastructure.
“It’s commonplace to see doctors having multiple screens and multiple monitors. In healthcare, these screens are not cheap. In the operating room, each of those monitors can be about $20,000. If you do the math, you can see it costs $40,000 to $80,000 compared to one Vision Pro,” says Dr. Tommy Korn, chief spatial computing officer at Sharp HealthCare.
Korn explains that hospitals have been slow to update technological infrastructure, with many hospitals relying on the same tech as they did in the 1980s. Gadgets like tablets and smartphones are only just now starting to be widely adopted.
The Vision Pro is appealing because it enables doctors to replace multiple monitors in operating rooms or when completing medical paperwork with relevant patient data. Radiologists, for instance, could also blow up scans into 3D models for better diagnoses instead of staring at 2D images. Surgeons could see patient data and augmented overlays to guide incisions, as opposed to printed paper instructions or multiple overhead monitors. You get the idea.
For now, those are hypotheticals that Korn and other global health institutions are currently conducting feasibility tests for — a lengthy undertaking given that hospitals must adhere to higher regulatory standards than typical businesses for patient privacy and safety. Even so, the promise was compelling enough that Korn bought 30 Vision Pros for his hospital.
But even the evangelists and enterprise users are clear-eyed about the challenges ahead. Comfort, fit, price, and lack of flexibility were all cited as major pain points.
“I actually prefer to wear my Vision Pro with a rigid head strap called the Annapro,” says Justin Ryan, an XR creator who runs Spatial Insider. Ryan says he had to figure out his own way to make the headset wearable for longer durations, which includes forgoing the light seal.
“Once you get rid of the light seal, for people that are concerned about makeup, that helps alleviate those concerns. I don’t have hair, so I’m never worried about messing my hair up, but it’s a very common thing for people when they say ‘I don’t know if I want to put this headset on.’”
Some are also concerned about whether companies are willing to stick it out for the long haul. One of the biggest hurdles developers and businesses have is sussing out which companies are truly committed to the space — and which might discontinue a headset after a year or two.
“It’s a bad value and a worse investment. But that’s not really what it’s about to me.”
“The biggest challenge right now is that it’s still very much a niche market, far from being stable,” says Tom Krikorian, a visionOS developer who creates enterprise-focused apps. “Apple is mostly known for doing consumer devices such as the iPhone, so I think there’s a valid concern that they might just not invest more in the future of Vision Pro if it doesn’t make ‘very big’ money.”
As for the Galaxy XR headset and its Android XR operating system, Krikorian says developers are weighing whether Google can deliver. Google has a history of underinvesting and prematurely pulling the plug on projects, and developers will have to learn the ropes from scratch. “I’m definitely curious about it, but given my current clients, I’m not sure it’s going to be a hit for enterprise just yet,” says Krikorian.
But for some, it doesn’t really matter if these headsets ever become mainstream.
“It’s a bad value and a worse investment. But that’s not really what it’s about to me,” says Ruby Voigt, an XR enthusiast. Voigt isn’t a dev, but she keeps her Vision Pro on a shelf right under her Apple LISA computer. For her, getting a taste of the future and owning a piece of tech history is enough.
