The company’s latest mainstream VR device promises better performance in a smaller package.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has officially unveiled Meta Quest 3, the latest addition to the company’s lineup of Meta Quest VR headsets. Coming this fall, Quest 3 promises a variety of improvements over 2020’s Quest 2. This includes everything from improved visuals to high-resolution colored passthrough for more realistic mixed reality experiences.
Improved hardware
Similar to Quest 2 and Quest Pro, Quest 3 is a standalone VR device, meaning no additional hardware is required in order to operate. According to Meta, Quest 3 is roughly 40% thinner than Quest 2 while capable of delivering twice the performance thanks to the next-generation Snapdragon chipset and pancake optics. This means better visuals and smoother gameplay.
Quest 3 features full-color passthrough technology powered by 4MP RGB color cameras and a depth sensor. Just like Quest Pro, the Quest 3 can turn your living room into a mixed reality arcade. I’m very curious to see how popular XR games and apps such as Painting VR and Demeo play on the new device.
“Ultimately, our vision is to enable you to move through all realities in a way that’s intuitive and delightful,” said Mark Rabkin, VP of VR in an official release, “going beyond the rigid classifications of ‘virtual reality’ and ‘mixed reality’ to deliver truly next-gen experiences that let you effortlessly blend the physical and virtual worlds.”
“Meta Reality gives you both the deep, immersive magic of VR and the freedom and delight of making your physical world more fun and useful with MR,” he added. “We’re excited to see what developers and creators can build on the Quest Platform when the possibilities are limitless.”
New controllers
Each Meta Quest 3 will come packaged with a pair of Touch Plus controllers. These new controllers feature an improved ergonomic form factor and TruTouch haptics for more realistic feedback. Touch Plus controllers ditch the outer tracking rings featured on the Quest and Quest 2 controllers, but lack the onboard cameras included with the Touch Pro controllers.
That said, you can pair the Touch Pro controllers with Quest 3 for an improved experience. The headset will also feature built-in hand-tracking out-of-the-box.
Full-color mixed reality
In terms of content, Quest 3 will serve as the primary home for a new wave of immersive VR games and apps. The device will also be backward compatible with Quest 2’s massive catalog of over 500 VR games and mixed reality apps, which means no shortage of content to enjoy.
Meta Quest 3 will be available later this year starting at $499 for the 128GB model. Meta says that additional storage options will be available for purchase. We can apparently expect more information during this year’s Meta Connect event, which is scheduled to take place on September 27th. Meta’s Quest Gaming Showcase is also taking place later today, during which we can expect plenty of new game announcements.
But that’s not all. Today’s reveal also came with some exciting news for Quest 2 and Quest Pro owners. Meta is rolling out a software update that will improve the CPU performance of the aforementioned headsets by up to 26%. Quest 2 and Quest Pro will also be receiving GPU speed increases of 19% and 11% respectively as well a Dynamic Resolution Scaling.
Quest 2 will also be receiving a price reduction of $299 for the 128GB model and $349.99 for the 256GB model. For more information on today’s announcement check out Meta’s official blog post.
Feature Image Credit: Meta
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