Apple’s Vision Pro has a problem a year into its existence: Not enough apps
Apple CEO Tim Cook (L) takes a selfie with a greets customers on arrival for the release of the Vision Pro headset at the Apple Store in New York City on February 2, 2024.
Angela Weiss | AFP | Getty Images
When Apple revealed the Vision Pro in 2023, it called the $3,500 headset its next “major platform.” Two years later, and a year after going on sale, the device is thin on apps.
Apple doesn’t regularly release stats on the number of Vision Pro apps that are available, and it’s hard to tell how many new apps come out in any given month. According to consultancy AppFigures, which tracks Apple’s platforms, the number of new Vision Pro apps has declined every month since the device hit the market in February 2024.
When Apple unveiled the Vision Pro, executives said that developers would be able to create new experiences that weren’t possible with traditional computers. But so far, top developers remain mostly focused elsewhere, and major tech companies like Google, Meta and Netflix have yet to release their most important apps for the headset.
Many of the new apps and ideas for the Vision Pro are coming from independent developers, hacking on the weekends while holding down day jobs.
One person in the indie camp is Adam Roszyk, a programmer in Poland who has created 17 Vision Pro apps since the headset was first released.
For $4, Roszyk’s Night Vision app lets a Vision Pro user tap the depth-sensing cameras of the device to see objects in the dark. If you spend $5, you can perform a chore in a Luigi’s Mansion-like video game using the app Vacuume, which overlays virtual coins on your floor that you can vacuum up, along with any real dirt or dust. And for $6, Roszyk’s app Scan Export lets users create a 3D digital scan of an entire building just by walking around, a useful tool for those in construction or real estate.
“We are still early, and we don’t really know how it can be really useful in your life,” Roszyk said. “There’s so many different ideas that just come to your mind.”
Roszyk continues to work on Vision Pro apps because he said he believes “spatial computing” — Apple’s preferred terminology for headset and glasses technology that can integrate 3D objects with the world around them — will be the next big platform. Roszyk is betting that developing apps now can put him in prime position when more people are walking around with a Vision Pro or, perhaps some day, lightweight glasses.
“This type of computing is the future,” Roszyk said. “I would definitely compare it to the first iPhones.”
Roszyk’s efforts have made him money, but not enough for Vision Pro development to become his full-time job. His 17 apps have cleared about $4,000 on the App Store in the last three months. That number is growing as he releases more apps and more people find out about them, Roszyk said.
Apple updated its most recent Vision Pro app count in August, with CEO Tim Cook telling investors on an earnings call that the platform had 2,500 apps. That number covers fully immersive apps that overlay virtual objects over the real world as well as 2D apps with some spatial components.
By AppFigures’ count, less than 1,900 of these apps remained active at the end of January.
Apple declined to comment.
Rival Meta in 2023 said that it had 500 apps in its Quest store, and the company last year said that number had multiplied by 10.
The Quest 3S, which has many of the same features as the Vision Pro, starts at $300. Meta also sold millions of its predecessors in recent years. While Meta hasn’t revealed how many users it has, its Meta Quest app was downloaded about 6 million times in 2024, according to AppFigures data, a useful proxy because users need to download the app in order to set up the headset.
There are also about 1.5 million Vision Pro apps that are ported versions of iPhone and iPad apps. Apple automatically ports iPhone and iPad apps to the Vision Pro when they’re uploaded, but companies can decline. Those apps can be used inside the headset but appear as 2D flat screens. Meta started to emulate that strategy last year with 2D Android apps for Quest, but the company doesn’t have the same library of millions of existing mobile apps.
Apple doesn’t publish Vision Pro sales, but one estimate from IDC suggests fewer than 1 million devices have been sold.
Some services like Netflix and YouTube, and game streaming services like Nvidia GeForce Now can be accessed through the Apple Vision Pro’s browser. And existing apps often receive updates that introduce a spatial mode, such as the NBA scores app, which recently got an experimental feature that allows users to watch a live basketball game as if the players were miniature figurines on a table.
Apple Arcade, a monthly game subscription from Apple, does require that its titles support the Vision Pro in addition to iPhones and iPads. Apple Arcade developers are paid by Apple and their apps are free to subscribers.
Although many of those games are 2D, some are exclusive to the Vision Pro. In January, Apple released Gears & Goo, a Vision Pro app that enables the player to control an army of goofy frog-like characters on a table in the real world.
Meanwhile, Meta is actively courting VR developers with a promise that they can make money. Meta in January said that its payment volume for Quest headsets rose by 12% last year, although it didn’t cite a total number. Meta has also said it has 200 apps that have made more than $1 million through software sales.
No iPhone-like app gold rush
The Apple Vision Pro headset is displayed at the Fifth Avenue Apple store on Feb. 2, 2024 in New York City.
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images News | Getty Images
The Vision Pro app gold rush has seen slower uptake than the iPhone’s app boom.
A year after the iPhone App Store was launched in 2008, Apple was crowing about the platform having 50 million customers, 2 billion downloads and 85,000 apps. Apple regularly told investors and developers how much money it had paid from App Store sales — it hasn’t released any similar stat for the Vision Pro.
Many in the VR industry hoped Apple’s entry would kick off a boom like the iPhone did for mobile apps, creating fortunes as millions of users sought to fill their new devices with fresh software.
“My assumption back then was whatever Apple releases might be in that final form, so it’s a good idea to be ready as early as possible,” said Nikhil Jacob, who runs Vision Uni, which publishes content about developing apps for the Vision Pro. “But my assumption there ended up being wrong.”
Jacob said he believes that an app developer ecosystem for the Vision Pro will take a lot longer to build out than it did for the iPhone because key pieces are missing. Jacob hopes Apple improves the Vision Pro app store to help users find new apps.
The slow uptake, due largely to the high price tag, has led some to worry that VR and its related technologies are once again entering a lull.
“Winter has come,” said Jarrett Webb, who develops headset apps for Argodesign, a software consultancy. “Even Apple couldn’t produce a winner.”
Still, some optimism remains among Vision Pro developers.
They say that Apple’s hardware is solid, the company’s developer tools are improving, and that the Vision Pro lays the groundwork for future software and hardware updates. It also helps that Vision Pro owners still seem to be excited to try out new apps.
Apple’s entry into the headset market, combined with Google’s recent announcement of its own Android XR platform, as well as Meta’s billions of dollars of investment signals that there will be a market for VR content, said John Gearty, who worked on the Vision Pro at Apple and is the founder of PulseJet Studios, a VR production house focusing on music. Gearty is hoping for steady growth from the market, but he has tempered his expectations.
“I don’t think it’s ever going to be hockey stick growth,” he said.
Apple has not said if it will update the Vision Pro. According to analysts, the company is working on a successor. Developers want it to be lighter and less expensive. They welcome any improvements that would get it on more faces.
“Over time, everything gets better, and it too will have its course of getting better and better,” Cook told The Wall Street Journal in October. “I think it’s just arguably a success today from an ecosystem-being-built-out point of view.”
— CNBC’s Jonathan Vanian contributed to this report.
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