Meta confirms the next consumer Quest VR headset is coming in 2023

Meta on Wednesday confirmed that it plans to launch the next consumer version of the Quest virtual reality headset in 2023. The social media giant acknowledged the planned launch in a press release delivering its third quarter financial results. 

Reality Labs hardware costs are expected to grow in the coming months, Meta said in a statement attributed to CFO David Wehner, “driven by the launch of our next generation of our consumer Quest headset later next year.”

The confirmation comes a couple weeks after Meta unveiled the Quest Pro — a version of the headset targeted at business and enterprise users. That device’s capabilities have been tailored for “collaboration and productivity,” with full-color AR to power virtual workspaces, conference rooms and collaborative design projects.

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Meta’s Quest 2 launched in 2020 and is immensely popular. In the first quarter of 2022, Meta controlled 90% of the market for VR headsets, according to IDC. Meta increased the cost of the device earlier this year, without any hardware improvements. 

Meta’s serious investments in the metaverse allow it to offer exclusive VR content and hardware at subsidized costs. Metaverse expenses will continue to increase in 2023, Meta noted in its Q3 report. 

“We do anticipate that Reality Labs operating losses in 2023 will grow significantly year-over-year,” Wehner said in his statement. Reality Labs refers to the Facebook business segment that includes augmented and virtual reality related hardware, software and content. 

“Beyond 2023, we expect to pace Reality Labs investments such that we can achieve our goal of growing overall company operating income in the long run.”

Overall, Meta reported its revenue was down 4% year over year to $27.7 billion and earnings per share were down 49% to $1.64. The number of daily active users on Meta’s family of products rose 4%.