Apple Vision Pro

Christopher Parr, is the Editor and Chief Content Creator for…

Breaking news! Today at WWDC, Apple unveiled its highly anticipated AR/VR product, the Apple Vision Pro. Equipped with an OLED lens, this cutting-edge device brings spatial computing to the forefront. Powered by the new R1 chip, which eliminates lag, and complemented by the M2 chip, the Vision Pro offers unparalleled performance. Moreover, the visionOS, specifically designed for spatial computing, serves as the foundation for this groundbreaking platform.

Apple’s Vision Pro, starting at the higher than expected $3,499 (further fueling the debate of Are Apple Products Overpriced?), is set to hit the market early next year. Initially, it will be exclusively available in Apple retail stores within the United States.

Representing Apple’s first venture into mixed reality, the Vision Pro headset provides users with a truly immersive experience. Once the headset is worn, users interact with it through a fully three-dimensional interface. The best part is that no additional devices are required; users can effortlessly control the interface using their fingers and voice commands.

Meet Apple's New Vision Pro - Spatial Computer — Meet Apple’s New Vision Pro – Spatial Computer

With the inclusion of EyeSight technology, the Vision Pro reveals the wearer’s eyes, enabling them to see and be seen by those around them. This feature ensures that users remain connected to their environment while enjoying the benefits of the Vision Pro headset. Whether in an office setting or working remotely, the Vision Pro proves to be the perfect companion.

The headset boasts a microOLED Apple silicon backplane and features two display panels with an impressive total of 23 million pixels. This remarkable display capability allows for the rendering of 4K videos at full resolution, delivering stunning visual experiences.

To enhance the immersive nature of the experience, the Vision Pro incorporates a new Spatial Audio system that provides ambient sound. By employing audio ray-tracing, the device can match the sound to the environment, further deepening the sense of presence.

Under the hood, the Vision Pro harnesses the power of the M2 chip alongside a dedicated “R1” chip, specifically designed for real-time sensor processing. This combination ensures seamless performance and precise tracking, enhancing the overall user experience.

In terms of software, the Vision Pro leverages visionOS, which enables the seamless integration of iPhone and iPad apps. This vast ecosystem of apps will be available to users upon the device’s launch, providing a wide range of functionality. The Vision Pro will also feature a brand new App Store dedicated to discovering apps built for visionOS, as well as compatible iPhone and iPad apps.

For secure authentication and quick access, the Vision Pro utilizes Optic ID, a technology that leverages the wearer’s iris for user authentication and unlocking the device.

Apple’s Vision Pro, with its advanced technology and immersive capabilities, is set to revolutionize the world of mixed reality. With an early next year release date and availability in select Apple retail stores within the United States, anticipation is already building for this groundbreaking device.

More details on the Apple Vision Pro below:

Apple’s highly anticipated WWDC event showcased a groundbreaking technology breakthrough that could have far-reaching implications. At the forefront of this momentous announcement was the long-awaited Apple “Vision Pro” headset, a slimmed-down device poised to revolutionize the realms of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR).

Spatial Computing Redefined by Apple’s Vision Pro

Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, drew striking parallels to the company’s iconic products during the event, proclaiming that just as the Mac introduced personal computing and the iPhone introduced mobile computing, the Vision Pro would usher in a new era of spatial computing. This ambitious statement set the stage for Apple’s inaugural foray into mixed reality.

Immersive Experience and Intuitive Control

The Vision Pro headset boasts a sleek design and an array of innovative features, aiming to immerse users in a world beyond traditional displays. With the freedom to scale and position apps at will, users can break free from the constraints of fixed screens, embracing a more natural and intuitive interaction with digital content.

Seamless Transition Between AR and VR

A standout feature of the Vision Pro headset is its seamless switching between AR and full VR experiences. Users can effortlessly transition between these modes using a convenient dial, providing unparalleled flexibility to explore a wide range of applications that span from immersive virtual environments to augmented overlays on the real world.

Controller-Free Interface for Unrestricted Interaction

The Vision Pro headset introduces a revolutionary controller-free interface, redefining the way users interact with digital content. By simply directing their gaze, users can effortlessly navigate through rows of app icons, selecting them with a tap and scrolling with fluid flicking motions. Voice commands further enhance the hands-free control capabilities, creating a truly intuitive and immersive user experience.

Remaining Connected with EyeSight Technology

Apple prioritizes ensuring wearers of the Vision Pro headset remain connected to their surroundings. The device incorporates EyeSight technology, allowing the display of the wearer’s eyes to those nearby. This transparency promotes better social interactions, fostering a sense of presence and eliminating feelings of isolation. In full VR mode, a glowing screen obscures the eyes, indicating that the user is currently unavailable for immediate interaction.

Seamless Integration of Real and Virtual Worlds

Leveraging passthrough video technology, the Vision Pro headset offers wearers a full-color view of the real world, seamlessly blending digital and physical environments. This advanced feature enables users to project 3D objects into their surroundings, such as extracting objects from a message thread and placing them directly into the real world. Such capabilities enhance the interactivity and depth of the AR experience, fostering a more immersive and dynamic interaction with digital content.

Enhanced Connectivity and Productivity

The Vision Pro headset supports Bluetooth accessories, expanding its functionality and personalization options. Users can connect their Mac devices to the headset, effectively extending their computer’s display into the virtual space. This seamless integration enhances productivity and convenience, enabling users to effortlessly transition between their Mac and the immersive world of the Vision Pro headset.

Immersive Communication with Spatial Audio

When engaging in remote conversations, the Vision Pro offers spatial audio, an innovative audio technology that enhances communication. Users can arrange FaceTime participants as “video tiles” around the room, creating a more immersive and engaging communication experience. This spatial audio feature adds a new dimension to virtual communication, simulating the feeling of being physically present with others.

Capturing and Reliving Memorable Moments

To capture and relive memorable moments, the Vision Pro includes a built-in 3D camera. Users can record videos within the headset, capturing their experiences from a unique perspective. These immersive memories can be revisited and shared, offering a means to relive past experiences.

A Paradigm Shift in Mixed Reality

Apple’s Vision Pro headset signifies a significant leap forward in the world of mixed reality. With its seamless transition between AR and VR, intuitive control mechanisms, integration with the real world, and enhanced communication features, the Vision Pro delivers an unparalleled and versatile mixed-reality experience. It sets the stage for the future of spatial computing, unlocking new possibilities for interactions with digital content and connections with others.

The Official Apple Vision Pro Release from Apple:

CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA Apple today unveiled Apple Vision Pro, a revolutionary spatial computer that seamlessly blends digital content with the physical world, while allowing users to stay present and connected to others. Vision Pro creates an infinite canvas for apps that scales beyond the boundaries of a traditional display and introduces a fully three-dimensional user interface controlled by the most natural and intuitive inputs possible — a user’s eyes, hands, and voice. Featuring visionOS, the world’s first spatial operating system, Vision Pro lets users interact with digital content in a way that feels like it is physically present in their space. The breakthrough design of Vision Pro features an ultra-high-resolution display system that packs 23 million pixels across two displays, and custom Apple silicon in a unique dual-chip design to ensure every experience feels like it’s taking place in front of the user’s eyes in real time.

Memories come alive: Featuring Apple’s first three-dimensional camera, Apple Vision Pro lets users capture, relive, and immerse themselves in favorite memories with Spatial Audio. Every spatial photo and video transports users back to a moment in time, like a celebration with friends or a special family gathering. Users can access their entire photo library on iCloud, and view their photos and videos at a life-size scale with brilliant color and spectacular detail. Every Panorama shot on iPhone expands and wraps around the user, creating the sensation they are standing right where it was taken.

Extraordinary New Experiences

Apple Vision Pro brings a new dimension to powerful, personal computing by changing the way users interact with their favorite apps, capture and relive memories, enjoy stunning TV shows and movies, and connect with others in FaceTime.

An infinite canvas for apps at work and at home: visionOS features a three-dimensional interface that frees apps from the boundaries of a display so they can appear side by side at any scale. Apple Vision Pro enables users to be even more productive, with infinite screen real estate, access to their favorite apps, and all-new ways to multitask. And with support for Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad, users can set up the perfect workspace or bring the powerful capabilities of their Mac into Vision Pro wirelessly, creating an enormous, private, and portable 4K display with incredibly crisp text.

Engaging entertainment experiences: With two ultra-high-resolution displays, Apple Vision Pro can transform any space into a personal movie theater with a screen that feels 100 feet wide and an advanced Spatial Audio system. Users can watch movies and TV shows, or enjoy stunning three-dimensional movies. Apple Immersive Video offers 180-degree high-resolution recordings with Spatial Audio, and users can access an exciting lineup of immersive videos that transport them to entirely new places.

Spatial computing makes new types of games possible with titles that can span a spectrum of immersion and bring gamers into all-new worlds. Users can also play over 100 Apple Arcade games on a screen as large as they want, with incredible immersive audio and support for popular game controllers.

Immersive Environments: With Environments, a user’s world can grow beyond the dimensions of a physical room with dynamic, beautiful landscapes that can help them focus or reduce clutter in busy spaces. A twist of the Digital Crown lets a user control how present or immersed they are in an environment.

FaceTime becomes spatial: With Apple Vision Pro, FaceTime calls take advantage of the room around the user, with everyone on the call reflected in life-size tiles, as well as Spatial Audio, so it sounds as if participants are speaking right from where they are positioned. Users wearing Vision Pro during a FaceTime call are reflected as a Persona — a digital representation of themselves created using Apple’s most advanced machine learning techniques — which reflects face and hand movements in real time. Users can do things together like watch a movie, browse photos, or collaborate on a presentation.

Even more app experiences: Apple Vision Pro has an all-new App Store where users can discover apps and content from developers, and access hundreds of thousands of familiar iPhone and iPad apps that run great and automatically work with the new input system for Vision Pro. Apple’s developer community can go even further and take advantage of the powerful and unique capabilities of Vision Pro and visionOS to design brand-new app experiences, and reimagine existing ones for spatial computing.

A Revolutionary Operating System and User Interface

Built on the foundation of decades of engineering innovation in macOS, iOS, and iPadOS, visionOS was designed from the ground up to support the low-latency requirements of spatial computing. The result is a revolutionary operating system that delivers powerful spatial experiences that can take advantage of the space around the user, unlocking new opportunities at work and at home.

visionOS features a brand-new three-dimensional interface that makes digital content look and feel present in a user’s physical world. By responding dynamically to natural light and casting shadows, it helps the user understand scale and distance. To enable user navigation and interaction with spatial content, Apple Vision Pro introduces an entirely new input system controlled by a person’s eyes, hands, and voice. Users can browse through apps by simply looking at them, tapping their fingers to select, flicking their wrist to scroll, or using voice to dictate.

Apple Vision Pro also features EyeSight, an extraordinary innovation that helps users stay connected with those around them. When a person approaches someone wearing Vision Pro, the device feels transparent — letting the user see them while also displaying the user’s eyes. When a user is immersed in an environment or using an app, EyeSight gives visual cues to others about what the user is focused on.

Breakthrough Design

Apple Vision Pro builds on Apple innovation and experience designing high-performance products like Mac, iPhone, and wearables like Apple Watch, culminating in the most advanced personal electronics device ever. To achieve ambitious goals for performance, mobility, and wearability, Apple utilized the most advanced materials possible.

Apple Vision Pro has an astonishing amount of technology in a compact design. A singular piece of three-dimensionally formed and laminated glass is polished to create an optical surface that acts as a lens for the wide array of cameras and sensors needed to blend the physical world with digital content. The glass flows into the custom aluminum alloy frame that gently curves around the user’s face, while the modular system allows for a tailored fit to accommodate a wide range of people. The Light Seal is made of a soft textile, and comes in a range of shapes and sizes, flexing to conform to a user’s face for a precise fit. Flexible straps ensure audio remains close to the user’s ears, while a Head Band — available in multiple sizes — is three-dimensionally knitted as a single piece to provide cushioning, breathability, and stretch.¹ The band is secured with a simple mechanism, making it easy to change to another size or style of band.

Unrivaled Innovation in Hardware

Apple Vision Pro is designed to deliver phenomenal compute performance in a compact wearable form factor. Featuring a breakthrough ultra-high-resolution display system built on top of an Apple silicon chip, Vision Pro uses micro-OLED technology to pack 23 million pixels into two displays, each the size of a postage stamp, with wide color and high dynamic range. This technological breakthrough, combined with custom catadioptric lenses that enable incredible sharpness and clarity, delivers jaw-dropping experiences. Users with vision correction needs will use ZEISS Optical Inserts to ensure visual fidelity and eye tracking accuracy.

An advanced Spatial Audio system is core to the Apple Vision Pro experience, creating the feeling that sounds are coming from the environment around the user and matching the sound to the space. Two individually amplified drivers inside each audio pod deliver Personalized Spatial Audio based on the user’s own head and ear geometry.³

In addition to creating a breakthrough display and advanced audio experiences, the high-performance eye tracking system in Apple Vision Pro uses high-speed cameras and a ring of LEDs that project invisible light patterns onto the user’s eyes for responsive, intuitive input.

These groundbreaking innovations are powered by Apple silicon in a unique dual-chip design. M2 delivers unparalleled standalone performance, while the brand-new R1 chip processes input from 12 cameras, five sensors, and six microphones to ensure that content feels like it is appearing right in front of the user’s eyes, in real time. R1 streams new images to the displays within 12 milliseconds — 8x faster than the blink of an eye. Apple Vision Pro is designed for all-day use when plugged in, and up to two hours of use with its external, high-performance battery.

Industry-Leading Privacy and Security

Apple Vision Pro is built on a strong foundation of privacy and security, and keeps users in control of their data.

Optic ID is a new secure authentication system that analyzes a user’s iris under various invisible LED light exposures, and then compares it to the enrolled Optic ID data that is protected by the Secure Enclave to instantly unlock Apple Vision Pro. A user’s Optic ID data is fully encrypted, is not accessible to apps, and never leaves their device, meaning it is not stored on Apple servers.

Where a user looks stays private while navigating Apple Vision Pro, and eye tracking information is not shared with Apple, third-party apps, or websites. Additionally, data from the camera and other sensors is processed at the system level, so individual apps do not need to see a user’s surroundings to enable spatial experiences. EyeSight also includes a visual indicator that makes it clear to others when a user is capturing a spatial photo or video.

Pricing and Availability

Apple Vision Pro starts at $3,499 (U.S.), and will be available early next year on apple.com and at Apple Store locations in the U.S., with more countries coming later next year. Customers will be able to learn about, experience, and personalize their fit for Vision Pro at Apple Store locations. For more information about Vision Pro, visit apple.com/apple-vision-pro.