Meta Platforms has slashed the prices of its virtual reality headsets in hopes of increasing demand for its VR gear as its daring metaverse bets battled for so much of publicity.
His the flagship Meta Quest Pro will retail for $999, down 33% from the starting price of $1,499, and the Quest 2 256GB version for $429 from $499, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a broadcast on his social media platform Instagram on Friday.
The corporate cited lower Quest 2 sales as the reason for a 17% drop in revenue in the fourth quarter at its Reality Labs unit, which incorporates VR-related offerings.
The division lost $13.7 billion last 12 months and greater than $10 billion in 2021.
Meta is receiving heat from investors for pouring money into the Metaverse which has not yielded the expected advantages.
Late last 12 months, the company launched the Quest Pro, positioning it as the most advanced VR headset with potential for further development of use cases.
![Mark Zuckerberg in headphones](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/NYPICHPDPICT000004522164.jpg?w=1024)
Quest Pro, with its outward-facing cameras that capture a 3D live feed of the physical environment and enabling novelties akin to the ability to hang virtual images on real partitions, was aimed toward designers, architects and other creative professionals.
Meta has recently sobered up its stance on the Metaverse and is specializing in cost-saving. The corporate called 2023 the “12 months of Efficiency” and predicted billions in spending cuts this 12 months.
While VR headsets have recently added more advanced features, adoption outside of the gaming community has been slow.
Last month, Tencent, the world’s largest video game publisher, shelved plans to enter VR hardware while it held talks to distribute its Meta Quest product line in China.