The expensive VR headset made its debut back in October 2022 with a US$1,499 price tag, however, the latest we’ve got from the company is that it’s thinking about a huge price slash as much as US$500.
In fact, the decision is said to go into effect as soon as March 5th, literally tomorrow. So people who have had an interest in purchasing the Meta Quest Pro can now grab one for as low as US$999, especially if you’re in the US and Canada while the Asian and European markets will get the price update by March 15th, according to an official report.
Another product getting a price slash is the 256GB variant of the Quest 2 headset which will now reportedly cost about US$429 from US$499.
“Our goal has always been to create hardware that’s affordable for as many people as possible to take advantage of all that VR has to offer,” the company says.
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While Meta has been going through a rough time, the company recently raised the prices of the two Quest 2 variants (128 and 256GB variants) by nearly US$100 back in June due to an alleged manufacturing cost.
The tech giant defended its stance regarding the price hike back then stating it was necessary in order to keep its VR arm of business afloat even though it had been subsidizing the costs of the headset hardware.
However, there was a dramatic shift in that stance as the company started lowering the prices of its VR headsets.
One of the suggestions about the main reasons for the sudden price drop may be attributed to low sales even though the tech giant said otherwise.
“By lowering the price of Meta Quest Pro, we’re making our industry-leading Meta Reality technology and Infinite Display optical stack available to even more businesses and professionals around the world.”
Meta added: “While we aren’t lowering the price of Meta Quest 2’s 128GB SKU, a new lower price for 256GB of storage will let even more people feel the joy of fully immersive games and experiences.”
However, an IDC analyst called Jitesh Ubrani who is familiar with the industry said “Meta’s VR shipments dropped 93% YoY in 2022Q4 while Pico rose 110%. That’s one of the big reasons behind these price cuts.”
As exciting as the VR invention was back in its early days, its adoption has been rather slow as most people still preferred to stick found with smartphones instead.
Also, a general adoption of the VR headset will definitely reset Meta’s metaverse success. A business that the tech giant has invested billions into even though its reception has been average at best by the general public.
One of the leading reasons for the low reception is trust issues that people have with Meta, especially its privacy policy and data harvesting policies.
Considering the fact that the metaverse is meant to literally replace the physical world according to Zuckerberg, Meta’s privacy ethics is very questionable and he’s not generally popular among young people.
