Pico is teasing a “new product launch” for August 20.
In social media posts on Facebook and X, the ByteDance-owned company wrote “Thrilled to share: PICO’s new product is on the way! For exploration or gaming, it boosts your MR/VR experience to next level.”
In a separate post, Pico shared a video showing a group chat called Pico Squad where a new blurred-out participant joined Pico 4, Pico Neo 3, and Pico G3.
Brace yourself for a surprise! Coming soon! 😼#PICO4 #Teaser #Upgrade pic.twitter.com/5tQhpynZe4
— PICO XR (@PICOXR) August 6, 2024
Over the past year we’ve seen a series of hints suggesting exactly what Pico will announce.
As far back as last September images appearing to show new ringless Pico controllers were shared on Chinese social media.
The Information reported in December that Pico 5 was canceled because Pico 4 sales “fell far short of ByteDance’s expectations”. That same report said ByteDance planned to release a refreshed version of Pico 4 instead.
In March the company trademarked “Pico 4S”, and icons of ringless “4S” controllers were found in the Pico Connect PC VR streaming software.
The first leak of actual specs emerged in June, through a Geekbench result that strongly indicates it will use the same Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset as Meta Quest 3 but paired with 12GB RAM, compared to 8GB for Quest 3.
A few weeks later, South Korea’s National Radio Research Agency (RRA) certified a new Pico headset. The filing revealed that the headset has 6GHz Wi-Fi support, meaning it features Wi-Fi 6E or Wi-Fi 7.
More recently, an apparent leaked marketing shot shared on Chinese social media (brought to our attention by VR enthusiast Luna) showed a new headset called Pico 4 Ultra, with ringless controllers and two front cameras, likely for stereo passthrough.
It’s possible that Pico has decided to rename Pico 4S to Pico 4 Ultra in the wake of Meta using “S” to mean lower end with the upcoming Quest 3S, while Pico’s new headset will ostensibly be higher end than its predecessor. Alternatively, the headset may be called Pico 4S in the west and Pico 4 Ultra in China.
We’ll keep a close eye on Pico in the coming weeks for any further hints or leaks of what it plans to announce, and we’ll bring you full coverage of the company’s August 20 event.
