{"id":187908,"date":"2025-06-16T02:54:17","date_gmt":"2025-06-16T02:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/187908\/"},"modified":"2025-06-16T02:54:17","modified_gmt":"2025-06-16T02:54:17","slug":"meta-quest-3-is-the-apple-vision-pro-for-the-rest-of-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/187908\/","title":{"rendered":"Meta Quest 3 is the Apple Vision Pro for the Rest of Us"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve tried them both, and the new Meta Quest 3<\/a> is no Apple Vision Pro<\/a>. At least as far as presenting a hyper-realistic mixed reality experience that overlays virtual objects and experiences into the real world while preventing you from bumping into the furniture. And for $500, versus $3,500 for Apple\u2019s still-unreleased headset, that\u2019s perfectly fine.<\/p>\n

The fact is that the Quest 3\u2019s biggest selling point, its color passthrough cameras, are more than good enough to wow even jaded VR veterans. No, you won\u2019t forget you\u2019re wearing a headset, as I sometimes did with my (highly curated) Apple Vision Pro demo, but I could walk around easily, read the time on my watch, mostly read text on my phone, and otherwise interact with the real world.<\/p>\n

See more: Meta Quest 3 in Pictures<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s too bad there are only a handful of Quest apps that take advantage of this new feature. That could be because the Quest ecosystem, like Apple\u2019s app store, is a walled garden filled with for-purchase games and productivity apps. At least there are a good number of free demos and experiments, which somewhat makes up for the fact that so many Quest apps feel expensive at $40-50.<\/p>\n

\"NobodyNobody looks cool wearing one of these things. Photo: Dan Ackerman <\/p>\n

The star right now is First Encounters<\/a>, a free game that scans your room and sends little fuzzy invaders into it through the walls and ceiling. It\u2019s not reinventing the wheel, but the whole thing comes together in a very impressive way, including mapping not only the walls and ceiling in your room but the furniture, too.<\/p>\n

The Quest 3 itself is more expensive than its predecessors, starting at $500 and going up once you add extras like more onboard storage ($150) and a better headstrap ($70). The default headstrap, just a couple of cloth straps with velcro, is embarrassing.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Quest 1, Quest 2 , and Quest 3. Photo: Dan Ackerman <\/p>\n

The Quest 2 launched at $300 back in 2020, so this is a sizable jump, but you can also look at it as costing the same as a PS5. Since this is primarily going to be used as a game device, no matter what metaverse advocates say, that\u2019s an apt comparison, and it certainly feels like you\u2019re getting $500 worth of technology.<\/p>\n

Besides being smaller and better balanced on your head than the Quest 2, the Quest 3<\/a> has a faster Snapdragon XR2 processor and 8GB of RAM (up from 6GB), and the per-eye resolution jumps from 1,832 x 1,920 to 2,064 x 2,208, which may not sound like a lot, but when all these updates are put together, it\u2019s a smoother, faster, better experience overall.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:Photo: Dan Ackerman <\/p>\n

In fact, just as the character creation tool in games like Baldur\u2019s Gate 3 can suck you in for hours, I loved just going through the process of scanning various rooms to set up the Quest\u2019s boundaries. It\u2019s a huge improvement over the draw-it-yourself version on most previous VR hardware, and the ability to recognize objects in the world around you \u2013 again, not specifically new to the Quest 3 \u2013 is what really sells a lot of people on the magic of mixed reality.<\/p>\n

The controllers get an upgrade as well, losing the hefty rings that surrounded your knuckles on previous versions. The future of VR is undoubtedly hand-recognition controls, something the Quest 3 does quite well, so I suspect we won\u2019t see a lot of further improvement in these.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Quest 2 controller (left) and the Quest 3 controller (right). Photo: Dan Ackerman <\/p>\n

Older games, like my son\u2019s current favorite, Gorilla Tag, and my long-time favorite, Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy\u2019s Edge, look a little crisper and run a little smoother, but it\u2019ll take time to get games specifically built for the new hardware. One of those games, Asgard\u2019s Wrath 2, is included with your purchase, but the game itself won\u2019t be available until mid-December.<\/p>\n

If you have a Quest 2, I wouldn\u2019t say this is a must-have upgrade, at least not until more Quest 3 only software is released. If you have an old Quest 1 or the older Oculus Rift, you\u2019ll be amazed at what this little standalone headset can do. And finally, if you\u2019re looking for the perfect gaming hardware holiday gift, with no new Nintendo Switch coming soon, in a lot of ways the Quest 3<\/a> is the only game in town.<\/p>\n

See all the latest hardware news and reviews from Gizmodo here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I\u2019ve tried them both, and the new Meta Quest 3 is no Apple Vision Pro. At least as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187909,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3162],"tags":[3245,19234,48153,128,77095,77096,77097,53,16,15,3243,3244,56979],"class_list":{"0":"post-187908","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-virtual-reality","8":"tag-apple-vision-pro","9":"tag-meta-quest-3","10":"tag-metaverse","11":"tag-nintendo","12":"tag-oculus-quest","13":"tag-oculus-rift","14":"tag-reality-labs","15":"tag-technology","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-virtual-reality","19":"tag-vr","20":"tag-wearable-devices"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114690790107743576","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}