Platform owner of Apple Vision Pro and visionOS, providing the hardware, operating system, SDKs, App Store distribution, and first-party spatial computing strategy.
Apple's first-party utility for importing, organizing, packaging, reviewing, and streaming Apple Immersive Video on Apple Vision Pro. The visionOS companion connects to a Mac to receive playlists from Apple Immersive Video Utility on macOS, supports synchronized multi-device playback for review sessions, and lets production teams inspect static and dynamic metadata of Apple Immersive Video packages.
Apple's internal partner-facing utility for video content providers to review SDR and HDR transactional or subscription videos, monitor event-based streams, and approve iTunes Extras before they go live in the TV app. The visionOS build lets Apple's media delivery partners QA stereoscopic, immersive, and standard video on Apple Vision Pro. Requires Apple system credentials and partner role access.
Free native visionOS interactive experience that ships with Apple Vision Pro. Lets viewers come face-to-face with life-size 3D dinosaurs from the Cretaceous period as they burst into the room through a portal, with creatures that react to gaze and gestures. Built with director Andy Jones and executive producer Jon Favreau's Fairview Portals studio.
Apple's presentation app, designed for Apple Vision Pro. On visionOS, presenters can rehearse decks inside immersive Environments like a Conference Room or Theater, use a virtual laser pointer and pen to annotate slides while presenting, and add, edit, and view 3D objects directly inside slides. Presentations can be played back, shared, and co-edited with collaborators on other Apple devices.
Apple executive publicly tied to Apple Vision Pro and Apple's smart glasses work through leadership of the Vision Products Group after Mike Rockwell's move to Siri.
Paolo Villanueva is a public App Store developer associated with Jumpfinity, a native Apple Vision Pro app.
Brenna Argall is a Northwestern professor and Project DRIVE principal investigator whose assistive-robotics software work was cited by Northwestern as helping power Apple's Apple Vision Pro eye-tracking wheelchair-control feature.
Yuki Kobayashi (小林佑樹) is the co-founder and CEO of MESON Inc., a Tokyo-based spatial computing studio. He was selected at WWDC 2023 as one of the first Japanese developers to try Apple Vision Pro, and his team shipped the native visionOS weather app SunnyTune in the platform's launch wave in January 2024. He was a speaker at the Apple Vision Pro Developer Conference "Let's visionOS" in Beijing (March 2024) and writes publicly about spatial computing strategy.
Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) is a technology YouTuber whose Apple Vision Pro coverage, including launch reviews and follow-up assessments such as 'What's Going on with Apple Vision Pro?', reaches a mainstream audience and shapes public perception of the device.
Michael Temper is a public App Store developer associated with Porta Nubi: Immersive Puzzles for Apple Vision Pro.
Paul Hudson is the creator and editor of Hacking with Swift, an educational platform for Swift, SwiftUI, iOS, macOS, watchOS, and visionOS development. He authored multiple Swift books and ran Unwrap Live 2024, a one-day online workshop dedicated to building visionOS apps with SwiftUI, RealityKit, ARKit, and Reality Composer Pro.
Box co-founder and CEO publicly tied to Box on Apple Vision Pro through Apple's Vision Pro app launch coverage.
Independent developer of Void-X, a game available on Apple Vision and highlighted by Apple among Vision Pro launch-era spatial games.
PGA TOUR digital operations executive publicly tied to PGA TOUR Vision for Apple Vision Pro through Apple's Vision Pro app launch coverage.
Apple developer relations executive publicly tied to the Vision Pro launch app ecosystem through Apple's announcement of more than 600 Vision Pro apps.
Apple CEO publicly tied to the Apple Vision Pro launch and Apple spatial computing strategy.
Apple executive publicly tied to Apple Vision Pro and visionOS product strategy through Apple launch and visionOS 2 announcements.
TechCrunch reported, citing Reuters, that China's Cyberspace Administration approved Apple Intelligence for China through a deal to integrate Alibaba's Qwen AI model into Apple's operating systems, including visionOS. Alibaba also told CNBC that Qwen would be integrated into Apple Intelligence experiences for text and image understanding and generation, though no launch timeframe was provided.
Apple released visionOS 26.6 beta 5 build 23O5765a to developers as part of its latest beta cycle for Apple Vision Pro platform testing.
Road to VR reported that Apple published detailed technical specifications for third-party Vision Pro motion controllers in its Accessory Design Guidelines for Apple Devices. The article says the new Spatial Accessories section covers tracked-accessory hardware requirements, LED wavelength and radiance requirements, and an example motion-controller logic board layout following Apple's WWDC spatial-accessory input work.
9to5Mac reported on The Elec's claim that Samsung Display scrapped a component-development project tied to a rumored lower-cost Apple Vision Pro. The item is treated as press coverage of Vision hardware roadmap rumors, not as confirmed Apple roadmap fact.
Apple published visionOS 27.0 beta 3 build 24M5316k for developers, continuing the developer beta cycle for the next major Apple Vision Pro operating-system release.
Apple released visionOS 26.6 beta 4 build 23O5757c to developers as part of its latest beta cycle for Apple Vision Pro platform testing.
BILD reported that CT scans were turned into a 3D tumor model for Apple Vision Pro so veterinarians could plan a dog surgery near Zwickau, Germany, after a conventional operation had been judged too risky.
Apple released visionOS 26.6 beta 3 to developers with build 23O5752d as part of its latest beta cycle for Apple Vision Pro platform testing.
9to5Mac reported, citing Bloomberg, that OpenAI hired Paul Meade, the Apple executive who had been in charge of Apple Vision Pro and Apple's smart glasses initiative, to work on OpenAI hardware efforts.
MacRumors reported that Apple raised the Vision Pro starting price from $3,499 to $3,699 as part of a wider hardware price increase across Macs, iPads, HomePod, Apple TV, and Vision Pro configurations. The article frames the change as especially notable because Vision Pro's original launch price was already widely viewed as a barrier to mainstream adoption.
MacRumors reported that Apple's Reality Composer Pro 3 beta, a tool for building spatial experiences for Apple Vision Pro, includes code references and workflow concepts tied to the defunct game engine The Machinery. The article frames the finding as a possible influence on Apple's spatial-computing developer tooling while noting that Apple has not confirmed how the technology entered the toolchain.
Apple published visionOS 27.0 beta 2 build 24M5306i for developers, continuing the developer beta cycle for the next major Apple Vision Pro operating-system release.
CineD interviewed director Ian Russell about filming Debut at the BBC Proms as an Apple Immersive Video production for Apple Vision Pro, including the separate stereoscopic 3D recording, Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera workflow, and spatial-audio postproduction.
AppleInsider compared Apple Vision Pro with Snap Specs, framing the products as opposing bets on face-worn computing: Vision Pro as a high-specification visionOS headset for immersive spatial computing, and Snap Specs as lightweight augmented-reality glasses for contextual overlays in the real world.
The VisionSpeech developer announced a public TestFlight beta for a private, on-device Apple Vision Pro dictation app with multilingual auto-detection, Orb and Studio modes, local NVIDIA Parakeet transcription, and a visionOS 26 requirement.
9to5Mac reported that visionOS 27 will run on all Vision Pro models but gives the M5 Vision Pro two advantages: Siri AI voice customization and access to Apple's more advanced on-device AI model.
Apple updated App Store Connect release notes to say developers can upload apps built with Xcode 26.6 RC 2 using the visionOS 26.5 RC SDK, alongside the other Apple platform RC SDKs, for App Store and TestFlight distribution.
Northwestern Now reported that Project DRIVE software from Northwestern University helps Apple's upcoming Apple Vision Pro eye-tracking wheelchair-control feature translate eye movements into compatible wheelchair commands; the article also notes integration with LUCI-enabled wheelchairs.
UploadVR reported that Apple's visionOS 27 developer materials and documentation reveal a larger update than the WWDC keynote suggested, including held-object tracking, an IR LED spatial-accessory framework, unfoveated screen recording, Siri AI and Visual Intelligence details, curved windows, expanded panoramas, and other Apple Vision Pro improvements.
Apple released visionOS 26.6 beta 2 to developers with build 23O5743c as part of its latest beta cycle for Apple Vision Pro platform testing.
Apple said the ImageCreator class is being discontinued and will no longer work in visionOS 27 or later. The developer notice says TestFlight builds on beta OS releases will hit runtime errors and public releases will no longer compile, pushing developers to use the Image Playground sheet or another image-generation service.
MacRumors reported that Apple's Vision Pro Travel Case disappeared from several international Apple storefronts while remaining on sale in the U.S., Canada, and UAE, pointing to a possible regional wind-down of the accessory.
MIKROE announced Spatial Anchor S1 and R1 trackers for Apple Vision Pro, positioning the modules as 6DoF spatial accessory hardware for developers and manufacturers building entertainment and industrial workflows.
Apple released the first visionOS 27 beta and published WWDC26 materials highlighting new spatial accessories support, the Spatial Preview framework, enhanced object tracking, and expanded immersive-video tooling for Apple Vision Pro developers.
DFRobot introduced its seeMote Cap and seeMote Cube hardware for visionOS developers, pairing a mountable 6DoF tracking module with a handheld controller to bring physical tools, buttons, and haptics into Apple Vision Pro workflows.
MacRumors reported that incoming Apple CEO John Ternus signed off on a Vision roadmap revision that, according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, drops both a second Vision Pro and a lighter Vision Air in favor of AI smart glasses and later waveguide AR glasses; the article also noted Mark Gurman's counterclaim that a Vision Pro 2 remains in testing even if the category is currently "on ice."
AppleInsider highlighted a newly published Apple patent application describing an Apple Pencil-like accessory for Apple Vision Pro that could simulate the texture and resistance of virtual surfaces through haptic feedback.
AppleInsider reported that recent Apple smart-glasses rumors now point to a late-2027 launch window, contrasting Bloomberg and Ming-Chi Kuo timelines and tying the discussion back to Apple's Vision Product Group and Vision Pro as the starting point for Apple's wearable AR/VR work. The article treated the claims as rumor and emphasized uncertainty around whether different reports describe the same Apple hardware effort.
AppleInsider reported on Bloomberg claims that Apple is still working on a next-generation Apple Vision Pro in parallel with smart glasses, but framed a slimmer, lighter, lower-cost Vision Pro successor as unlikely before late 2028 or 2029. The piece presented the report as internally inconsistent, noting the tension between claims that Vision Pro is on ice and claims that development continues toward a redesigned model.
Apple released visionOS 26.6 beta to developers and advised teams to test their apps against the latest beta platform updates.
Apple released "Real Madrid: The Weight of Greatness," a 20-minute Apple Immersive Video documentary, free on Apple Vision Pro. Shot during the 2025 Champions League with more than 30 Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive cameras over five days, it features Mbappé, Bellingham, Vinícius Júnior, and Courtois. Apple describes it as one of its largest Apple Immersive productions to date.
Apple previewed accessibility updates including generated subtitles across Apple Vision Pro and an eye-tracking power wheelchair control feature for compatible drive systems.
Apple revealed the 2026 Apple Design Awards finalists ahead of WWDC 2026, with visionOS represented across multiple categories. Notable visionOS finalists include Metaballs (Delight and Fun), NBA: Live Games & Scores and D-Day: The Camera Soldier (Innovation), Caradise by PSQV (Visuals and Graphics), and Pickle Pro by Resolution Games (Games). Winners will be announced at WWDC 2026.
MacRumors reports Apple has effectively ceased active development on Apple Vision Pro after the October 2025 M5 refresh failed to lift demand, with roughly 600,000 lifetime units sold, unusually high return rates, and the previously rumored lighter "Vision Air" reportedly shelved; the team has been redistributed, with focus shifting toward AI-first smart glasses. Daring Fireball and Tom's Hardware corroborate, noting Apple continues to hire into its Vision Products Group.
Apple released the fourth episode of its Apple Immersive Video travel series "Elevated," taking Vision Pro users on a nine-minute aerial tour of New York City past Times Square and the Statue of Liberty, paired with voiceovers from New Yorkers. The episode is available in the Apple TV app on Vision Pro.
Apple shipped the unified Apple Business app (version 2.0), a rebrand and expansion of Apple Business Essentials that for the first time supports Apple Vision Pro alongside iPhone, iPad, and Mac. The free enterprise suite consolidates Apple Business Manager, Business Connect, and Business Essentials in one place and adds a company directory for employees to find colleagues across their organization, giving Vision Pro fleets administered through Apple Business Manager a first-party on-device admin and discovery surface.
Valve released a native Steam Link beta for Apple Vision Pro via TestFlight, letting users wirelessly stream 2D PC and Mac games from Steam at up to 4K with adjustable panoramic display curvature. VR games are not supported in this release.
Apple released visionOS 26.4 for Apple Vision Pro on March 24, 2026, adding support for foveated streaming so endpoints can stream high-quality content only where the user is looking, an enhanced video podcast experience in Apple Podcasts, faster-starting Spatial Audio that remembers the acoustic properties of familiar rooms, support for AirPods Max 2, eight new emoji, and bug fixes and security improvements.
Mike Wuerthele's two-year retrospective for AppleInsider, published on the anniversary of the U.S. launch, described Apple Vision Pro as "an answer in search of a problem to solve." Wuerthele praised the hardware engineering but argued the software is still immature, the $3,499 price ceiling has prevented adoption, and the platform is stuck in a chicken-and-egg loop where roughly 3,000 native apps deter sales and weak sales deter developers. The piece concluded that even inside Apple there is little consensus about whether Vision Pro will achieve meaningful mainstream traction, and that the device is increasingly read as a transitional product on the road to smart glasses. MacRumors and other outlets published parallel two-year retrospectives the same day.
visionOS TC 2025 ran December 6-7, 2025 in Japan as a tech conference for developers, designers, and spatial image creators working with visionOS and Apple Vision Pro. Hosted by visionOS TC and featured by Step Into Vision, the single-track event capped attendance around 200 and welcomed talks on spatial experience, expression, and implementation. The conference aimed to grow the visionOS community in Japan with practical development techniques and creative XR/AR/MR content design.
Apple announced the 2025 App Store Awards winners with Explore POV named Apple Vision Pro App of the Year for its library of Apple Immersive Videos filmed around the world, and Porta Nubi by Michael Temper winning Apple Vision Pro Game of the Year for atmospheric light-bending puzzles. Winners were hand-selected by App Store editors from 45 finalists across categories.
Apple revealed the 2025 App Store Awards finalists, including the Apple Vision Pro App of the Year shortlist (Camo Studio, D-Day: The Camera Soldier, and Explore POV) and the Apple Vision Pro Game of the Year shortlist (Fishing Haven, Gears & Goo, and Porta Nubi). The Vision Pro app finalists were recognized for livestream creation tooling, immersive historical storytelling, and Apple Immersive Video curation.
Apple began selling Sony's PlayStation VR2 Sense controllers on its online store for $249.95 (with Sony's charging stand) for use with Apple Vision Pro, marking the first time Sony has sold the controllers separately from the PSVR2 headset. The launch follows Apple's announcement at WWDC25 that visionOS 26 would add native PSVR2 Sense controller support, bringing six-degrees-of-freedom tracking to enable VR-first games and apps on Vision Pro.
Marques Brownlee released a follow-up video on the second-generation Apple Vision Pro with the M5 chip, arguing the 2025 model is 'more or less the same as the original from two years ago' aside from a new dual-knit strap, and saying most $3,500 Vision Pro owners are barely using their headsets.
Apple announced retail availability of the updated Apple Vision Pro alongside the new iPad Pro and 14-inch MacBook Pro, making the M5 Vision Pro purchasable.
Logitech Muse, the first spatial stylus designed for Apple Vision Pro, launched on October 22, 2025, priced at $129.95 and sold directly by Apple. The pencil offers six degrees of freedom for low-latency motion, a pressure-sensitive tip, force-sensing button, and real-time haptic feedback for drawing, annotating, and interacting in 3D space within visionOS. Apps including Crayon, doppl by Interaptix, Sketch Pro, and Spatial Analogue are adding Muse support.
The updated M5 Apple Vision Pro ships with a "Product of Vietnam" label, marking a shift from the original China-built model produced by Luxshare Precision; Bloomberg reports it reflects Apple's broader effort to diversify advanced manufacturing of U.S.-bound devices to Vietnam, India, Thailand, and Malaysia, with the Dual Knit Band still made in China.
Apple announced an upgraded Apple Vision Pro with the M5 chip, Dual Knit Band, visionOS 26 features, improved performance, and new spatial apps and immersive content.
Purdue University opened its Spatial Computing Hub in Wang Hall room 2500 at the West Lafayette campus, attended by President Mung Chiang and Apple representatives. The hub uses Apple Vision Pro to support collaborative research, workforce training, and industry engagement in fields including semiconductor and pharmaceutical manufacturing, and anchors a planned online graduate certificate in spatial computing alongside existing Purdue online master's programs in microelectronics/semiconductors and software engineering.
Apple previewed a new slate of Apple Immersive Video films for Vision Pro, adding more sports, travel, music, and documentary content to the platform.
Apple released its 2025 platform updates, including visionOS 26 for Apple Vision Pro with persistent spatial widgets, spatial scenes, improved Personas, and other system features.
A European Commission filing surfaced Apple's January 2025 acquisition of TrueMeeting, a Tel Aviv-based startup whose smartphone face-scanning and 3D avatar technology is expected to help improve Apple Vision Pro's digital Personas, with more natural Personas shown in visionOS 26 at WWDC 2025.
Apple previewed visionOS 26 with spatial widgets, spatial scenes, improved Personas, new nearby sharing experiences, and expanded developer APIs for Apple Vision Pro.
Apple's developer session walks through visionOS 26's new volumetric APIs, the Object Manipulation API, scene and window persistence across reboots, 3x faster hand tracking, Sony PlayStation VR2 Sense and Logitech Muse spatial accessories, Nearby Window Sharing for SharePlay, Apple Projected Media Profile (APMP) for 180/360/wide-FoV media, Look to Scroll, and expanded enterprise APIs.
Apple's WWDC25 session introduces Nearby Window Sharing on visionOS 26, letting co-located Vision Pro users share apps via SharePlay with shared world anchors from ARKit, synchronized AVPlayer playback, updated window sharing flows for both nearby and FaceTime participants, and new APIs for placing content relative to nearby participant poses.
Apple's WWDC25 session walks developers through adopting the new spatial accessory input on visionOS 26 — building a spatial sculpting app driven by the Logitech Muse stylus (with force sensors and haptic feedback) and the PlayStation VR2 Sense controller (6DoF tracking, finger-touch detection, vibration), both newly supported by the platform for high-precision creative and gaming use cases on Apple Vision Pro.
Apple's WWDC25 session demonstrates how SwiftUI and RealityKit converge in visionOS 26, covering Model3D animation and ConfigurationCatalog support, the new Object Manipulation API via SwiftUI's manipulable modifier and RealityKit's ManipulationComponent, new ViewAttachmentComponent / PresentationComponent / GestureComponent for embedding SwiftUI views and gestures directly on entities, and observing RealityKit changes from SwiftUI.
Triband released a spatial adaptation of WHAT THE CAR? on Apple Vision Pro through Apple Arcade, letting players steer the surreal racer with hand gestures as if gripping a wheel. Apple framed the launch as a spatial reimagining of the 2024 D.I.C.E. Awards' Mobile Game of the Year.
Apple's 2025 Apple Design Awards dropped the standalone Spatial Computing category but highlighted Taobao by Zhejiang Taobao Network as the App Winner in the Interaction category for its Apple Vision Pro shopping experience with high-fidelity 3D product models. The 2025 awards were organized into six recurring categories: Delight and Fun, Inclusivity, Innovation, Interaction, Social Impact, and Visuals and Graphics.
Apple released "Bono: Stories of Surrender" globally on Apple TV+ and as the first ever feature-length film available in Apple Immersive Video on Apple Vision Pro. The Andrew Dominik-directed documentary, captured in 8K 180-degree video with Spatial Audio, adapts Bono's one-man stage show and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on May 17, 2025.
Apple Newsroom highlighted four of the 2025 Swift Student Challenge Distinguished Winners ahead of WWDC25 - Taiki Hamamoto, Marina Lee, Luciana Ortiz Nolasco, and Nahom Worku. Taiki Hamamoto's winning App Playground Hanafuda Tactics is being adapted for Apple Vision Pro, extending the traditional Japanese card game into spatial computing. Fifty Distinguished Winners were invited to a curated three-day experience at Apple Park around the June 9 WWDC25 keynote.
VisionDevCamp Fukuoka 2025 ran April 11-13, 2025 in Fukuoka, Japan as a non-profit developer event focused on application development for Apple Vision Pro and visionOS. The hackathon drew 38 registered attendees with 9 teams submitting projects, organized by David J Kordsmeier with Kanako Nagiri and Laurie. Judges came from IoTone Japan, Fukuoka Hacks, Engineer Cafe, Manabu Hubs, and Styly, with sponsorship from Engineer Cafe, IoTone Japan, Styly, Tagstand, and Unity Technologies Japan.
Apple released visionOS 2.4 for Apple Vision Pro, bringing Apple Intelligence features including Writing Tools, Image Playground, and Genmoji, plus the new Spatial Gallery app with curated spatial content, an Apple Vision Pro app for iPhone, and the ability to start Guest User sessions from a nearby iPhone or iPad.
Apple CEO Tim Cook reassigned Mike Rockwell from leading the Vision Products Group to overseeing a rebuild of Siri, reporting to software chief Craig Federighi. Paul Meade, previously head of hardware engineering for Vision Pro, took over the Vision Products Group.
Apple released a new Apple Immersive concert experience with Metallica on Apple Vision Pro, filmed during the band's sold-out M72 World Tour finale in Mexico City. The piece features full performances of "Whiplash," "One," and "Enter Sandman," captured with a custom 14-camera Apple Immersive Video rig of stabilized, cable-suspended, and remote-controlled dolly cameras, and is available free of charge in the Apple TV app on Vision Pro.
SwiftGG hosted LET'S VISION 2025 on March 1-2, 2025 at Flower Port in Pudong, Shanghai under the theme 'AI + Spatial Computing'. The two-day Apple ecosystem conference featured 40+ talks and 6 hands-on workshops focused on visionOS development and Apple Vision Pro applications. Apple Design Evangelist Sarah McClanahan keynoted with 'Design great apps for visionOS', and the 52-speaker lineup included Paul Hudson, Blackbox creator Ryan McLeod, and Create with Swift's Emanuele Agosta and Giovanni Monaco presenting 'Designing human-centered spatial experiences'.
Wesley Hilliard's one-year retrospective of Apple Vision Pro for AppleInsider argued that the device had moved beyond the early-adopter phase and that Apple now needed to demonstrate serious commitment to the platform. Hilliard praised the hardware but flagged missing Apple Intelligence support, insufficient native apps, and a slow immersive-content release cadence as ongoing concerns, lowering his rating from 4.0 to 3.5 stars. The piece argued Apple "needs to be an evangelist for its platform because it is the only one that can make a difference" and warned that competing Android XR headsets could ship with features Vision Pro still lacked. It was one of the most-cited entries in the February 2025 one-year-later wave of Vision Pro retrospectives.
Apple released visionOS 2.3, the third point update to visionOS 2, containing bug fixes and security improvements for Apple Vision Pro.
Apple Arcade launched Gears & Goo, a spatial real-time strategy game from Resolution Games built natively for Apple Vision Pro that combines tower defense and base building with hand and eye tracking. It is Resolution Games' third Apple Vision Pro title and the headline Vision Pro launch in Apple Arcade's January 2025 lineup.
Apple honored the inaugural Apple Vision Pro App of the Year and Game of the Year at the 2024 App Store Awards. What If An Immersive Story from Marvel Studios, ILM Immersive, and Disney+ won Vision Pro App of the Year, and THRASHER: Arcade Odyssey from Puddle, LLC won Vision Pro Game of the Year, recognizing experiences that pushed the boundaries of spatial computing.
Apple released visionOS 2.2 for Apple Vision Pro, introducing new Wide and Ultrawide curved Mac Virtual Display modes (with the Ultrawide equivalent to two 5K monitors side by side), Mac audio routing to Vision Pro, and embedded spatial photo and video playback on the web.
Apple debuted "Concert for One," a new Apple Immersive music series filmed at Air Studios in London, launching globally on Apple Vision Pro. The first episode features six-time BRIT Award-winning singer-songwriter RAYE performing an intimate R&B, jazz, and pop set alongside her 20-piece band, captured in 180-degree Apple Immersive Video with Spatial Audio.
At HackPrinceton 2024, the team behind Kepler shipped a visionOS and AR app that lets developers visualize and navigate a git repository as a spatial multiverse on Apple Vision Pro. The project took home three category awards at the student hackathon: Best DevTool, Best Use of AI, and Best Job Interview Application, demonstrating spatial-computing entries continuing to win at general-purpose student hackathons.
Apple released "The Weeknd: Open Hearts," a 180-degree Apple Immersive Video music experience directed by Anton Tammi, exclusively on Apple Vision Pro. The piece pairs ultra-high-resolution immersive video and Spatial Audio with a surreal Los Angeles cityscape and was made available free of charge via the Apple TV app on Vision Pro.
Apple released visionOS 2.1 to Apple Vision Pro users, the first point update to visionOS 2, containing bug fixes and security improvements recommended for all users.
Apple released "Submerged," the first scripted film captured in Apple Immersive Video, on Apple Vision Pro. The 17-minute World War II short, written and directed by Academy Award winner Edward Berger, follows a submarine crew struggling to survive a torpedo attack and was made available for free in the Apple TV app on Vision Pro.
Apple released visionOS 2 as a free update, bringing spatial photo conversion from 2D images, new hand gestures for Home View and Control Center, an expanded Mac Virtual Display, mouse support, improved Personas, Travel Mode for trains, and Apple TV Multiview to Apple Vision Pro.
Vision Hack 2024, held remotely September 13 to 15, drew more than 185 developers and was described by organizers as the largest Apple Vision Pro event outside of Apple. Teams shipped visionOS apps across 48 hours competing for $25,000 in prizes, with categories including most creative, best use of immersive space, and best game. Coverage from VRHermit and Road to VR documented projects from across the global visionOS developer community.
Apple released visionOS 1.3 for Apple Vision Pro, the final 1.x platform release ahead of visionOS 2. The update introduces no new user-facing features and focuses on bug fixes and security improvements as Apple readies the broader visionOS 2 update for fall 2024.
Apple rolled out a new Lake Vrangla immersive environment to Apple Vision Pro users as a server-side push outside of a visionOS version release, depicting the Norwegian lake engulfed in fog with reflective water and a calming night version, available to download from the Environments tab of Home View on both visionOS 1 and the visionOS 2 beta.
Apple introduced a slate of new Apple Immersive Video content for Apple Vision Pro, including the Boundless series starting with Hot Air Balloons, plus upcoming releases Wild Life, Elevated, and the first scripted immersive film Submerged from director Edward Berger, along with a partnership with Blackmagic Design on the URSA Cine Immersive camera.
Organizers Matt Hoerl (Beautiful Things), Cosmo Scharf (visionOS Dev Partners), and Brian Boyd Jr. announced Vision Hack, billed as the first global visionOS hackathon, with $25,000 in cash and prizes. The fully remote event was scheduled for September 13 to 15, 2024 and offered three winners per category at $3,000, $1,500, and $500. The hackathon's stated goal was to grow the Apple Vision Pro app catalog by giving developers 48 hours of focused build time on spatial-computing apps.
Apple marked the debut of Apple Vision Pro outside the United States, with the spatial computer going on sale in China mainland, Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore through Apple Store retail locations and online.
iQIYI released iQIYI XR for Apple Vision Pro on June 27, 2024 as one of the first batch of native apps on the visionOS App Store at the Chinese mainland launch. The app provides over 25,000 videos, supports Dolby Vision and iQIYI's eXave MAX technology for 4K HDR streaming, and includes 3D emoji for bullet comments plus an immersive IP viewing experience based on the series Love Between Fairy and Devil.
Apple Arcade released Warped Kart Racers by Lively and Electric Square on Apple Vision Pro, letting players race characters from 20th Television animated series including American Dad!, Family Guy, King of the Hill, and Solar Opposites in a spatial kart racer. The announcement also previewed Cityscapes Sim Builder for Vision Pro on July 3.
At the AWE Vision Workshop preceding AWE USA 2024 in Long Beach, Daniel Marqusee of Bezi delivered a 30-minute session on Designing for Apple Vision Pro. The talk walked through design principles for visionOS, including Apple's Human Interface Guidelines, and best practices for building applications tailored to Apple's spatial computing platform.
Apple Developer published a curated WWDC24 visionOS guide grouping the week's spatial computing sessions for Apple Vision Pro developers. The guide spans what's new in visionOS 2, volumetric SwiftUI scenes, RealityKit cross-platform updates, enterprise APIs, TabletopKit, ARKit additions, Compositor Services, spatial photos and video, Apple Immersive Video tooling, and design sessions for spatial apps.
WWDC24 session 10166 walked developers through the different types of stereo media supported on Apple Vision Pro — 3D videos, Apple Immersive Video, and spatial photos and videos. The session showed how to capture, detect, and display spatial media in apps, and how to author spatial content with accurate metadata and perfectly aligned stereo images for visionOS.
In WWDC24 session 10139, Apple engineer Kyle McEachern introduced a new managed entitlements program for Apple Vision Pro with enterprise APIs that grant approved organizations expanded device access. The session covered main camera access, passthrough capture, the Barcode Detection API built on top of the camera feed, on-device machine learning via the Apple Neural Engine with the Object Tracking helper APIs, app compute settings for raising performance headroom, and Spatial Barcode and QR Code scanning for spatial workflows.
WWDC24 session 10103 detailed the cross-platform expansion of RealityKit to iOS, iPadOS, and macOS alongside visionOS. New APIs cover custom hover effects, force effects and physics joints, portal crossing, blend shapes and inverse kinematics for character animation, animation timelines, low-level mesh and texture access, and integrated Metal shader workflows for fully dynamic 3D content across Apple platforms.
WWDC24 session 10096, presented by the designers of Encounter Dinosaurs, shared design considerations for compelling interactive narrative experiences on Apple Vision Pro. The session covered crafting stories that adapt to any space and size, layering multiple levels of interaction for accessibility, and combining animation, spatial audio, and custom gestures unique to visionOS.
WWDC24 session 10086 collected lessons from Apple designers on creating spatial computing apps for Apple Vision Pro. The session covered embracing immersion, designing for eyes and hands, leveraging depth, scale, and space, and identifying a visionOS app's key moment — the experience optimized specifically for spatial computing.
TOPPAN announced Metapa for Vision, a native visionOS version of its Metapa metaverse mall service, to coincide with the Apple Vision Pro launch in Japan on June 28, 2024. The app lets users view the mall as a spatial diorama, move between viewpoints, enter virtual stores, and inspect products at full scale through touch or pinch. The launch tenant is TelesaShop Metapa Store, with TOPPAN planning expansion to 50 stores and beyond commerce into education, tourism, business, and lifestyle experiences.
At the WWDC24 Platforms State of the Union, Susan Prescott and Apple engineers detailed the visionOS 2 developer story alongside Apple Intelligence, Swift 6, Xcode 16, and updates across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS. The spatial computing segment highlighted volumetric SwiftUI scenes, new enterprise APIs for Apple Vision Pro, TabletopKit for tabletop multiplayer experiences, expanded RealityKit support on iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and tools for creating Apple Immersive Video.
Apple previewed visionOS 2 with spatial photo generation, new hand gestures, Mac Virtual Display improvements, Travel Mode updates, Guest User, and new developer APIs.
Apple announced that Apple Vision Pro would begin its first international rollout, with availability in China mainland, Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore on June 28, followed by Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom on July 12.
Apple released visionOS 1.2 for Apple Vision Pro alongside its other June 2024 platform updates. The release adds account-driven device and user enrollment via Managed Apple IDs, iMessage Contact Key Verification, the ability to anchor closed captions to playback controls during Apple Immersive Video, more accurate virtual keyboard cursor positioning, and improved reliability for Mac Virtual Display discovery and connection.
Apple's 2024 Apple Design Awards introduced a new Spatial Computing category to celebrate the best apps for Apple Vision Pro. djay by Algoriddim won for apps and Blackbox for Vision by Shapes and Stories won for games, with finalists including Sky Guide, NBA, Synth Riders, and Loona: Cozy Puzzle Games.
TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo published a widely circulated note saying Apple had cut 2024 Vision Pro shipments to 400,000-450,000 units, well below market consensus of 700,000-800,000, and that Vision Pro demand had "fallen sharply beyond expectations" in the United States. Kuo wrote that Apple was reviewing and adjusting its head-mounted display roadmap, that there might be no new Vision Pro model in 2025, and that shipments could decline year-over-year in 2025. The note shaped the dominant analyst narrative that Vision Pro was missing its initial sales targets and triggered follow-up reporting from 9to5Mac, MacRumors, and the broader tech press.
Deloitte Digital expanded its Apple practice and launched the Academy for Apple Vision Pro, a set of one-week instructor-led courses ("The Business Value of visionOS", "visionOS for Engineers", "visionOS for Product Managers") delivered on-site, at Deloitte facilities, or virtually, aimed at engineers, product managers, and business leaders adopting Apple Vision Pro and visionOS, drawing on the firm's 8-year partnership with Apple and more than 100 trained visionOS practitioners.
Apple's Newsroom highlighted enterprise Vision Pro use cases including KLM Royal Dutch Airlines' Engine Shop maintenance app, Porsche's Race Engineer, NVIDIA Omniverse Cloud APIs, SAP Analytics Cloud, Microsoft 365 with Copilot, Cisco Webex, PTC's Onshape Vision, and Taqtile Manifest. Apple also announced the Enterprise Spatial Design Lab; Deloitte Digital concurrently launched a dedicated visionOS practice with one-week instructor-led courses.
VisionDevCamp, held March 29 to 31, 2024 in Santa Clara, CA, announced winners of its visionOS hackathon: Adam Tow won Most Creative for MixEffect Vision (a virtual Blackmagic Design video switcher); Paolo Villanueva, Yelena Kozlova and Kate Chen won Best Design for Little Spatial Garden; Arthur Baney and Scott Harris won Best Game for Table Soccer (built with Unity PolySpatial); Romy Ilano, Raymond Chen and Jayson McCauliff were recognized for Most Persistent Navigation Exploration; and Erin Pangilinan, Andre Cunha and Steven Pease won the Productivity Award for Time Cake.
Augmented World Expo announced the AWE Vision Workshop, a full-day pre-conference event dedicated to Apple Vision Pro, scheduled for June 17, 2024 at the Long Beach Convention Center ahead of AWE USA 2024 (June 18-20). The workshop was sponsored by Unity and hosted by VisionDevCamp co-founders Raven Zachary and Dom Sagolla, with sessions led by experts who had shipped the first visionOS consumer and enterprise apps. Topics included Apple's spatial computing platform, visionOS design principles, the three development paths (native visionOS, Unity, web), Vision Pro publishing, and consumer and enterprise case studies.
Apple notified the 350 winners of the 2024 Swift Student Challenge and, for the first time, named 50 Distinguished Winners invited to Apple Park for a three-day experience around WWDC24. Winners received a one-year Apple Developer Program subscription, an Apple Developer certification exam voucher, AirPods Max, and an official Apple certificate. Several winning Swift Playgrounds App Playgrounds projects targeted spatial and AR experiences runnable on visionOS.
Apple released visionOS 1.1, the first major update to the Vision Pro platform since launch. It introduces improved Persona rendering for hair, makeup, neck, and mouth; refined EyeSight; hands-free Persona enrollment; Mobile Device Management for enterprise; iMessage Contact Key Verification; virtual keyboard accuracy fixes; Mac Virtual Display reliability fixes; and captive Wi-Fi network support.
Y Combinator published an updated Request for Startups (RFS) authored by Managing Director Dalton Caldwell that added Spatial Computing to its list of areas it wants to fund, with TechCrunch reporting that Apple's launch of Apple Vision Pro motivated YC to flag the mixed reality environment as an investment focus for upcoming batches.
Apple released visionOS 1.0.3, the first software update for Apple Vision Pro after the headset's February 2 retail launch. The release includes important bug fixes and adds an option to reset the device if the user has forgotten their passcode.
Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) published his full Apple Vision Pro review on YouTube the day after the device went on sale in U.S. Apple Stores, titled "Apple Vision Pro Review - Tomorrow's Ideas with Today's Technology." The review became one of the most-watched and most-cited consumer takes on Vision Pro, praising the displays, eye tracking and gesture system as feeling like the future while flagging weight, comfort, the limits of personas, and the device's solitary nature as the fundamental tradeoffs of a v1 spatial computer. Brownlee framed the product as a credible glimpse of what spatial computing could become rather than a mainstream device for 2024.
Apple Vision Pro became available on Friday, February 2 at all U.S. Apple Store locations and the Apple Store online, marking the launch of Apple's first spatial computer. Apple confirmed more than 600 apps and games designed for Vision Pro were available at launch, alongside more than 1 million compatible iOS and iPadOS apps, with entertainment experiences from Apple TV+, Environments, and spatial experiences like Encounter Dinosaurs.
Japanese printing and digital communications group TOPPAN Holdings released two native visionOS apps in the Apple Vision Pro launch wave on February 2, 2024. Meet Japan! delivers 4K immersive visuals of Japanese heritage, nature, performing arts, and cuisine drawn from TOPPAN's library of more than 50,000 shots, and Natural Window provides ultra-realistic ambient nature scenery for calming spaces. TOPPAN stated plans to expand both apps with up to 50 pieces of content by 2025.
Microsoft released a native Teams app for Apple Vision Pro on launch day, bringing meetings, chats, calls, channels, and Microsoft 365 collaboration to visionOS. Video calls use Apple's Persona feature to render an authentic representation of the wearer, and the app integrates Copilot for AI-assisted meeting workflows on Vision Pro's infinite spatial canvas.
Microsoft launched seven Microsoft 365 productivity apps on Apple Vision Pro on day one (Teams, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, and Loop) with visionOS-specific features. PowerPoint includes an immersive Rehearse with Coach environment that simulates an audience, Word adds a distraction-free focus mode, Excel supports pinch-and-drag to move documents between apps, and Copilot is available across the suite.
Disney+ launched as a native Apple Vision Pro app on February 2, available to Disney+ subscribers at no additional cost. The visionOS app shipped with four immersive viewing environments — the Disney+ Theater inspired by Hollywood's El Capitan Theatre, the Scare Floor from Pixar's Monsters Inc., Marvel's Avengers Tower over downtown Manhattan, and the cockpit of Luke Skywalker's landspeeder on Tatooine — alongside support for select titles in stereoscopic 3D and Spatial Audio.
Apple said more than 600 apps and games designed for Apple Vision Pro would be available at launch, spanning sports, productivity, entertainment, gaming, learning, shopping, and wellness.
Nilay Patel's review of Apple Vision Pro for The Verge, titled 'Apple Vision Pro review: magic, until it's not', became one of the most widely cited launch-week critiques of Apple's first spatial computer. Patel argued Vision Pro is fundamentally a VR headset masquerading as an AR headset because Apple settled for real-time video passthrough, called the 3D persona system 'deeply weird and extremely uncanny', and concluded that the experience is inherently isolating: 'You're in there, having experiences all by yourself that no one else can take part in.' The review framed the central tension the Vision Pro discourse would return to for the next two years.
Tokyo-based spatial computing studio MESON released SunnyTune, a native visionOS sensory weather app, in the Apple Vision Pro launch wave. SunnyTune mirrors real-world conditions in a small spatial diorama with reactive skies, rain, and vegetation, lets users scrub time forward to preview the forecast, and compares weather across cities. The studio described it as one of the first Japan-developed apps shipped on the U.S. launch day of Apple Vision Pro.
Zoom previewed its native visionOS app ahead of Apple Vision Pro's February 2 launch, with support for Apple Personas so remote meeting participants see a spatial representation of a Vision Pro wearer's face and hand movements. The app scales to any size on the infinite canvas, and Zoom said 3D object sharing would follow later in spring 2024.
Bloomberg reported that YouTube and Spotify joined Netflix in declining to release native apps for Apple Vision Pro at its February 2 launch, and that the companies would also block their existing iPad apps from being available on the device. Netflix said subscribers could use the web browser on Vision Pro instead, mirroring how Netflix works on Macs. The decision left Vision Pro's launch-day media lineup leaning on Disney+, Max, Amazon Prime Video, Paramount+, Peacock, Apple TV+, and others while the largest streaming and video platforms stayed away from native visionOS.
Apple announced that Vision Pro would be available in the United States on February 2, 2024, with a new App Store for Vision Pro experiences and compatible iOS and iPadOS apps.
Apple 3D software engineer Dhruv Govil detailed how Universal Scene Description (USD) and USDZ underpin 3D content on visionOS, covering Quick Look on visionOS, the new Safari Model element for interactive 3D on the web, MaterialX shader support in RealityKit, Reality Composer Pro Shader Graph, and ongoing collaboration with Pixar, Autodesk, Adobe, and the Blender community on OpenUSD.
Apple Vision Science researchers Manda Paul and Herman Damveld presented design guidance for building comfortable visionOS experiences, covering depth cues, contrast and focus, head-locked versus world-locked content, transparency for moving objects, and oscillation frequencies to avoid in immersive scenes.
Apple introduced Reality Composer Pro, a new macOS developer tool for composing, editing, and previewing 3D content for visionOS. The WWDC23 session, presented by Apple's Eric Chiu, walked through scene composition, particle emitters, spatial and ambient audio, asset optimization with the Statistics editor, and previewing scenes live on an Apple Vision Pro device.
A foundational WWDC23 session for visionOS developers that walks through creating a new visionOS Xcode project, choosing between windows, volumes, and immersive spaces, using RealityView to render RealityKit content inside SwiftUI, integrating Reality Composer Pro scenes, and handling gesture targeting on 3D entities.
Apple unveiled Apple Vision Pro and visionOS at WWDC, establishing the hardware and operating system foundation for Apple's spatial computing ecosystem.
Apple's Platforms State of the Union session at WWDC23 followed the keynote with a deep technical dive into visionOS, walking developers through the new spatial operating system, Reality Composer Pro, SwiftUI and RealityKit updates for spatial computing, and the visionOS SDK availability later in June 2023.