Meta announces the Meta Quest 3

Rumored for a while, Meta finally made official the Meta Quest 3 today. This new headset starts at $499 and has some really good looking improvements over the previous VR HMD.

For starters, it has a lot slimmer profile now, which I assume will be coming from using pancake lenses like the Meta Quest Pro. The smaller profile should also come with reduced making it more comfortable to wear for long periods of time. Meta is saying it's 40% slimmer when compared to the Quest 2.

One the front you can see some nice full color cameras for passthrough that should make XR a lot more engaging. The video shows off one of my favorite VR games, Demeo, being played on tabletop where the board is superimposed onto it in 3D. You get to walk around and see it from all angles, making the game a very immersive experience.

Whereas the past controllers had tracking rings, the new controllers are lot more compact with the need for them. I don't think these controllers have inside out tracking themselves like the Quest Pro controllers do, but you can pick those up to use with the Quest 3 if you want that functionality. That said, these new controllers also feature TruTouch haptics that were on the Pro controllers to let you feel what's going on in your VR world.

All games that you have on the Quest 2 will be playable on the Quest 3 so you won't lose any of your game library should you decide to upgrade. The games will run faster due to the Quest 3's newer Snapdragon chip. Fret not though as Meta will be coming out with an update to improve performances on Quest 2 and Pro models.

$499 is the starting price for the Meta Quest 3 and that will be for the 128GB edition and is due this Fall. Starting on June 4th, the Quest 2 will drop to $299.99 for the 128GB version and $349.99 for the 256GB version, making the 128GB version cost the same as it was when it was first released.

More information will be coming on September 27th.