Is the Metaverse Dead? Meta Pulls Horizon Worlds From Quest Headsets

Meta is officially pulling the plug on its virtual reality social platform for headset users, marking a huge reversal from Mark Zuckerberg’s original metaverse vision of the future.

According to a report from Bloomberg, Quest headset owners will lose access to the virtual destination known as Horizon Worlds starting June 15.

The company confirmed on Tuesday that consumers will no longer be able to build, publish, or update virtual reality environments through their headsets. While the immersive version of the platform is being shut down, Meta said that access to these virtual worlds will continue exclusively through the Meta Horizon mobile app.

A spokesperson for Meta pointed to a company update from earlier this year, noting that the tech giant is shifting its focus almost entirely toward mobile experiences rather than the fully immersive worlds once accessed via VR hardware. This change follows a series of internal shifts at Reality Labs, the division responsible for the company’s virtual reality offerings.

Earlier this year, Meta began cutting a huge number of jobs within that division while closing down several VR game and content studios. Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth told staff in a previous memo that the company would prioritize mobile phone experiences moving forward.

The strategy shift comes as Meta diverts billions of dollars away from the metaverse and into the rapidly growing artificial intelligence race. Resources at Reality Labs are now being moved toward wearable AI products, such as the Ray-Ban Meta glasses.

Meta has spent well over a whopping $80 billion US on its metaverse efforts through its Reality Labs division, which has accumulated nearly $80 billion in cumulative operating losses since late 2020. That’s a huge chunk of change.

The metaverse is slowly becoming extinct it seems, and that sucks for early adopters that bought headsets to embrace the virtual world. Time to go back to living in real life, people.