Today Facebook announced that multi-user accounts and app sharing between accounts will be available on Oculus Quest headsets starting from next month.
According to Facebook, these are two of the most requested features from Quest users. They go hand-in-hand: not only will multiple users be able to log into a headset from next month, but the headset’s primary account will be able to share their apps and purchases with secondary accounts on the same device. This allows for multiple users to to progress through a game or experience with their own progress, save files and achievements.
Both primary and secondary accounts will still require a Facebook login. App sharing only applies locally to secondary accounts on a headset, not across multiple headsets. For example, a primary account can share its content with a secondary account that is also logged in on the same headset. But if the owner of that secondary account were to log in as the primary account on their own headset, they would not have access to the other user’s content on that device unless they purchase it themselves.
A primary account can share all its content to the secondary accounts on the headset, but it does not work the other way around — the primary account will not be able to access any content associated with a secondary account that they do not already own themselves. The secondary accounts will be able to make their own purchases on a shared device, but these won’t be shared with the other accounts logged into the headset.
However, multi-device sharing is on the horizon — Facebook said that it will “later expand to allow a primary account holder to share their purchases across three devices.” The post also noted that the only way to change the primary user on a headset will be to perform a factory reset.
Based off the information above, it seems that for a household with multiple Quest headsets, the best option would be to have only one person’s account logged in as the primary account on all devices, with others members then logged into their own headsets as secondary accounts. If everything is purchased on the primary account only, then all the users in the family would have equal access to the same content without complications.
All new apps submitted to the Oculus Store from February 13 will need to support app sharing. Existing apps will be automatically opted in to app sharing from February 13, but can opt out for “contractual or other reasons” until February 12.
The features will roll out as experimental at first, allowing a primary account to add up to three secondary accounts from next month. You can read more over on the Oculus Developer blog.
