Skip to main content

Digital Trends may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site. Why trust us?

Apple’s cheaper version of Vision Pro headset could be years away

A person wearing Apple's Vision Pro headset.
Apple

Apple’s new Vision Pro mixed-reality headset has been mostly warmly received, but its high price has left many wondering if it’ll actually sell.

Unveiled last week at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference, the Vision Pro — the company’s first new product category since the Apple Watch landed in 2015 — comes with a $3,500 price tag, making it more than three times the price of Meta’s top-of-the-range Quest Pro, which costs $999.

Recommended Videos

But just as Meta has the more affordable Quest 3 headset costing $499, Apple is also expected to produce a cheaper version of the Vision Pro.

According to reliable Apple leaker Mark Gurman, the tech giant is “already working on a cheaper model to get the new product category onto the faces of more people,” with the headset perhaps taking the name Apple Vision or Apple Vision One.

However, the company is “currently planning a release of the cheaper model for as early as the end of 2025, meaning it won’t debut for about two years after the original Vision Pro,” Gurman said on Sunday in his weekly newsletter for Bloomberg.

To reduce the product’s price, elements of the Vision Pro will have to be toned down or discarded. For example, Gurman suggests that Apple might install screens of a lower quality than those in the Pro. It could also opt for either an iPhone-grade chip or an older Mac chip, and use fewer cameras which would reduce its performance capabilities compared to the premium model.

Apple might also use a simpler headband design, Gurman said, and require AirPods for spatial audio in place of the speakers built into the Vision Pro.

Other changes might include a move to a physical adjuster for interpupillary distance (the distance between the centers of your eyes) over an automatic one and the possible removal of features such as the 3D camera.

But Gurman suggests that the device will retain the external EyeSight screen that shows a wearer’s eyes, and also the eye- and hand-tracking system that eliminates the need for hand controllers.

“Combined with a more refined production process, economies of scale, and a cheaper frame, I’d imagine Apple could knock several hundred dollars off the price,” Gurman predicts.

If that turns out to be correct, the device will still cost a fair bit and so could prompt some customers interested in experiencing AR/VR to consider rival devices.

Want to see how the Vision Pro stacks up against Meta’s Quest Pro? Digital Trends has you covered.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Apple might be working on two top secret monitors, and that could be big news for Mac users
A person using an Apple Mac Studio (2022) computer at a desk.

If you’re in the market for one of the best monitors and are leaning towards an Apple-branded product, you’ve got two options right now: the Studio Display and the Pro Display XDR. Yet while these are both excellent monitors in their own right, both of them have their problems -- but that might all be about to change.

That’s because a new rumor has claimed that Apple is secretly working on two new monitors. That means there’s a chance the company’s entire monitor range could be refreshed, which would be great news for creatives and professional users.
Updates are needed

Read more
My Mac Pro hopes have been dashed, and Apple can’t save it this year
A person uses an Apple Mac Pro alongside three monitors and an editing console in a darkened room.

Last week, Apple revealed a new Mac Studio equipped with M4 Max and M3 Ultra chips. No, that’s not a typo -- the company really did launch a new Mac with chips from two different generations, where the less powerful chip is from the newer iteration. As I’ve written before, it’s a confusing, ridiculous situation, and one that must be driving Apple’s marketing division mad.

But at first, it seemed like there was a glimmer of reasoning behind the decision: Apple could save the rumored M4 Ultra chip for the Mac Pro and bring back some proper differentiation to the Mac lineup. Instead of having the Mac Studio and the Mac Pro offer the same maximum performance (as we have now), the Mac Pro would finally get a sizeable boost to tempt power-hungry pro users.

Read more
Apple Vision Pro tipped for a serious upgrade at WWDC 2025
Alan Truly enjoys the Apple Vision Pro's look and pinch user interface.

News about the Vision Pro or its future successors has been pretty slow lately but according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is planning a big release for visionOS 3.

There aren't many details at the moment, but Gurman says that Apple "can't just let the Vision Pro die out" because it has invested too much into the technology and it needs to keep the device alive and updated for the people who bought it. He says visionOS 3 will be "a pretty feature-packed release," and that we'll find out more about it at WWDC 2025 this year.

Read more