Meta Quest 3 shipments reportedly cut by millions due to “weak demand”
MetaA tech insider has reported that the upcoming VR headset, the Meta Quest 3, appears to have had its shipments cut significantly.
The Meta Quest 3 was officially shown off just a week ago, and already some bad news has come out of Zuckerberg’s next big product. According to tech analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Meta has cut the production of Quest 3 units by several million units.
Kuo’s main takeaway from the reason for the cut is due to “weak demand” from the general public. Virtual reality has not hit as intended by the major corporations creating the headsets. Sony’s PlayStation VR 2 launched this year to a semi-muted response as it failed to land and even had its own units cut during production.
According to Kuo, the original intention was to produce seven million Quest 3 headsets in the second half of 2023. Meta has now cut this down to an alleged two to two and a half million units. In 2024, Meta expects to ship just a million headsets.
Is the Quest 3 in trouble?
MetaFurther in Kuo’s report, the insider said that it should be expected to see the Meta Quest drop in shipments further in 2024. On top of this, the latest smart glasses from Meta, a joint venture between the social media company and Ray-Ban are only expected to ship around “1.5 million units over the entire lifecycle”.
Kuo further reports that the collaboration has only seen a maximum of 400,000 units shipped, which is below expectations.
The main part that should cause Meta some concern is that Kuo states that the continued troubles within Meta’s VR business should “warrant investors’ attention”.
Meta’s big push into the metaverse has not been successful, as it’s regularly reported how much money has been spent on the technology that very few users are actually using. Its other headset, the Quest Pro, has effectively already been retired.