Facebook is launching two new VR headsets. As mentioned earlier today, the Oculus Rift S is an updated headset that plugs into your PC and which features a higher-resolution display, inside-out position tracking, and a more comfortable design. And the Oculus Quest is a new standalone headset that doesn’t require a computer at all.

They’re both up for pre-order for $399 starting today, and both should ship May 21st.

But it’s the Oculus Quest that’s probably going to garner the most attention at launch, because it’s not quite like anything else on the market… for better or worse.

The Quest is Facebook’s second standalone headset. Last year the company began selling the Oculus Go for $199 and up. While the entry-level price was pretty attractive, that model came with a simple controller and lacked support for motion tracking.

The Oculus Quest has four built-in cameras for inside-out position tracking, which means you’ll be able to move through virtual reality experiences as you move through real space. It also comes with two handheld motion controllers, much like those you get with higher-priced, PC-based VR systems.

Facebook’s new standalone headset is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor with Adreno 540 graphics and it has 4GB of RAM, which makes it a lot less powerful than any PC-based VR headset. That also means that some games and apps aren’t going to work on this model.

But with a resolution of 1600 x 1440 pixels per eye, it’s actually higher-resolution than many other headsets (although it has a refresh rate of just 72 Hz). And the Quest is a completely untethered devices, which means there are no cables to trip over and you can use the headset just about anywhere. It should get 2-3 horus of battery life.

Facebook is charging $399 for a model with 64GB of storage and $499 for a 128GB model.

Overall, the Oculus Quest seems like a big step up from the Oculus Go… and the lack of reliance on a PC with discrete graphics, could make the Quest a more attractive option for some potential customers.

That said, $399 isn’t exactly impulse buy territory. So Facebook and its developer partners are probably going to have to convince people that there are enough killer apps to justify spending that kind of money on a face computer.

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3 replies on “Oculus Quest standalone VR headset is also coming May 31 for $399”

  1. Facebook is certainly losing a lot of money on its VR venture. From what I’ve read, Oculus is well into the net negative. While they’re doing relatively okay within the VR market, the market itself is extremely small.

    I wonder how long they’ll keep throwing away money on this. I guess they just have that much money to continue with this experiment.

  2. So Facebook and its developer partners are probably going to have to convince people that there are enough killer apps to justify spending that kind of money on a face computer.

    I guess that’s still the problem no matter how fancy the hardware is. This thing could be free but if there isn’t much to do, then it’ll start collecting dust pretty quickly.

    1. Facebook is heavily hinting that they are in it for the long run and the hardware isn’t going to become more expensive, so, I guess, they want their own Vita-like ecosystem, just for VR.

      I’m not that convinced on the question of ports, I kinda think that purpose-built games just for Quest do more sense, but we’ll see.

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