Apple CEO Tim Cook (L) will take selfies to greet customers on arrival to release their Vision Pro headsets at the Apple Store in New York City on February 2, 2024.
Angela Weiss | AFP | Getty Images
when apple In 2023, they unveiled the Vision Pro, calling the $3,500 headset the next “major platform.” Two years later, one year after sale, the app will thin your device.
Apple doesn’t regularly release statistics on the number of Vision Pro apps available, making it difficult to tell how many new apps will appear in a given month. The number of new Vision Pro apps has been declining each month since the device came to the market in February 2024, according to Consultancy Appfigures, which tracks Apple’s platform.
When Apple announced Vision Pro, the executive said developers could create new experiences that traditional computers would not be able to do. But so far, top developers have remained mostly concentrated elsewhere, with major tech companies being Google, Meta and Netflix We haven’t released the most important apps for our headsets yet.
Many of the new apps and ideas in Vision Pro come from independent developers, keeping up daytime work while hacking over the weekend.
One of the indie camps is Adam Roszyk, a Polish programmer who has created 17 Vision Pro apps since the headset was first released.
Roszyk’s Night Vision app for $4, Vision Pro users can tap on the device’s depth detection camera to view objects in the dark. Spend $5 and you can use the app’s vacuum cleaner to do chores in video games like Luigi’s Mansion. This allows you to vacuum virtual coins that can be vacuumed along with actual dirt and dust. Roszyk’s App Scan Export allows users to create 3D digital scans of the entire building with just walking, a useful tool for people using construction or real estate.
“We’re still early and don’t really know how that will help in your life,” Roshik said. “There are so many ideas that just pop into your mind.”
Roszyk continues to work on the Vision Pro app. As we consider this to be “spatial computing,” it says that the next big platform will be the preferred term for headset and glasses technology that allows Apple to integrate 3D objects with the surrounding world. Roszyk bets that developing an app will put him in the best position when more people are walking around with Vision Pro, or perhaps one day, with lighter glasses.
“This type of computing is the future,” Roszyk said. “I’ll definitely compare it to my first iPhone.”
Roszyk’s efforts have made him money, but Vision Pro development is not enough to become his full-time job. His 17 apps have cleared around $4,000 on the App Store in the last three months. The number is increasing as he releases more apps and more people learn about them, Roszyk said.
Apple updated its latest Vision Pro App count in August, with CEO Tim Cook informing investors about its revenue call that there are 2,500 apps on the platform. That number covers completely immersive apps that overlay virtual objects in the real world, as well as 2D apps with several spatial components.
In AppFigures counts, less than 1,900 of these apps remained active at the end of January.
Apple declined to comment.
rival Meta In 2023, Quest Store said there were 500 apps, and last year the company multiplied that number by 10.
With many of the same features as the Vision Pro, the Quest 3S starts at $300. Meta has also sold millions of predecessors in recent years. Meta has not revealed the number of users, but according to AppFigures data, the Meta Quest app was downloaded about 6 million times in 2024. This is a useful proxy as you will need to download the app to set up your headset.
There are also around 1.5 million Vision Pro apps, ported versions of the iPhone and iPad apps. Apple will automatically port to Vision Pro when the iPhone and iPad apps are uploaded, but businesses could decline. These apps are available within the headset, but appear as a 2D flat screen. Meta began emulating that strategy last year with a 2D Android app for Quest, but the company lacks a library of millions of existing mobile apps.
Although Apple has not published Vision Pro Sales, one estimate from IDC suggests that under 1 million devices are on sale.
Some services, such as Netflix and YouTube, and services, such as game streaming services. nvidia GeForce is now accessible through the Apple Vision Pro browser. Also, existing apps often receive updates that introduce spatial modes such as NBA Score apps. This recently gave users the experimental feature that allows users to watch live basketball games as if they were miniature figurines on the table.
Apple Arcade, Apple’s monthly gaming subscription, requires that its titles support Vision Pro in addition to iPhone and iPad. Apple Arcade developers are paid by Apple, and their apps are free to subscribers.
Many of these games are 2D, but some are limited to Vision Pro. In January, Apple released Gears & Goo. Gears & Goo is a Vision Pro app that allows players to control an army of goofy frog-like characters at the real world tables.
Meanwhile, Meta actively courts VR developers with the promise that they can make money. In January, Meta said quest headset payments rose 12% last year, but did not cite the total. Meta also says there are 200 apps that have made more than $1 million through software sales.
There is no app gold rush like the iPhone
The Apple Vision Pro headset will appear on February 2, 2024 in the Fifth Avenue Apple Store in New York City.
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Vision Pro App Gold Rush has seen slower consumption than the iPhone app boom.
A year after the launch of the iPhone App Store in 2008, Apple was screaming about a platform with 50 million customers, 2 billion downloads and 85,000 apps. Apple regularly told investors and developers how much money they paid from selling the App Store. We have not released similar statistics for VisionPro.
Many in the VR industry hope that Apple’s entry will start a boom like iPhones did to mobile apps, with millions of users trying to fill new devices with fresh software, making fortunes. It was created.
“My assumption at the time was something that could be the final form of it, so I recommend getting ready as soon as possible,” he said, publishing content on developing Vision Pro apps. said Nikhil Jacob, who runs Reality Uni. “But my assumption has turned out to be wrong.”
Jacob said the Vision Pro app developer ecosystem thinks it will take much longer than it would have on the iPhone due to the lack of key pieces. Jacob hopes Apple will improve its Vision Pro App Store to help users find new apps.
Slow intake has led to worrying that VR and its related technologies are once again entering a lull.
“Winter is here,” said Jarrett Webb, who develops the headset app for software consultant ArgodeSign. “Even Apple couldn’t produce a winner.”
Still, optimism remains among Vision Pro developers.
They say Apple’s hardware is solid, its developer tools are improved, and Vision Pro is laying the foundation for future software and hardware updates. It also helps that Vision Pro owners seem excited to try out the new app.
Apple’s entry into the headset market combined with the recent announcement of Google’s own Android XR platform and the multi-billion dollar investment signal in Meta that there is a market for VR content, John worked on Vision Pro Gearty said. Apple is the founder of Pulsejet Studios, a music-focused VR production house. Gearty wants steady growth from the market, but he has eased expectations.
“I don’t think it’s going to be a growth for Hockey Stick,” he said.
Apple has not said whether to update Vision Pro. According to analysts, the company is working on a successor. Developers want it to be lighter and cheaper. They welcome improvements to get it with more faces.
“As time goes by, everything gets better and better, and it gets better,” Cook told the Wall Street Journal in October. “I think it’s definitely a success from the perspective of the ecologically built.”
– Jonathan Vanian of CNBC contributed to this report.
