(Image credit: Future) |
Even though Apple hasn't made the Vision Pro accessible outside of the US yet, the company is allegedly planning to release a replacement in 2026. Additionally, a source claims that the business will be providing a pleasant surprise to individuals who objected to the $3,500 price tag of the first version.
"The retail price is between 1500 to 2500 dollars," according to @Revegnus1 on X (previously Twitter). If this is accurate, it would be a stunning reversal in price, catapulting the headset into the realm of expensive MacBooks.
VisionPro Gen 2, coming in 2026
— J. Reve (@Revegnus1) May 10, 2024
- The retail price is between 1500 to 2500 dollars.
- Entering the Chinese SeeYA supply chain, currently in the stage of sending samples to Apple for evaluation.
- Following SK Hynix, Samsung is supplying LLW DRAM.
It's a hefty "if," though. This isn't the same @tech_reve X account that has previously shown to be correct, despite the fact that users of the blog may recognize the name "Revegnus."
That was disabled, and even if the @Revegnus1 account seems to be the same individual, it's too soon to say if its insights will hold up. However, back in March, the former account did tweet a report with identical accusations.
Possible Price Drop for Apple Vision Pro 2?
Although Apple naturally enjoys charging more for its best-selling items, this works against the specialized Vision Pro headset. The largest obstacle standing in the way of mixed reality evolving into the next iPhone—apparently Apple's long-term goal—is its $3,499 MSRP.
In fact, Ming-Chi Kuo, an analyst, claims that Apple has cut its headset shipping projection to about 450,000 devices, which is a small portion of the 232 million iPhones the firm is expected to ship in 2022 (or even the 11.6 million it achieved in 2008, its first full year).
But with time, technology does get more affordable. With the burden of an annual update cycle removed, Samsung was able to cut the price of its Galaxy Z Flip foldable phone by over a third in just 18 months. This means that Apple will have more time to cut expenses on the Vision Pro.
Nevertheless, even with Apple's resources, you can't just wish for cheaper parts, and the bits that really make the Vision Pro work are necessary pricey.
According to a breakdown of the expenditures, the materials for each Vision Pro 1 headset come to $1,542, excluding development, packaging, and marketing. Purchasing a headset at the lower end of Revegnus' estimate looks ambitious, even with some very optimistic projections on the long-term cost patterns of components.
This raises the prospect that Apple may close the gap by using less expensive components than those from the first generation, but even in that case, we just learned that Apple is "flummoxed" about how to cut costs with a potential "Vision SE."
It will be particularly harder to keep a device "Pro" while attempting to reduce the MSRP for customers, but Apple apparently views the twin 4K micro-OLED screens produced by Sony as one place to achieve economies on.
To put it briefly, it makes sense to approach the $2,500 offer with caution and the $1,500 offer with caution.
Given the lackluster outlook for a less expensive Vision Pro in the near future, you might want to look into the pre-owned market. The Verge discovered that during the first 84 days of release, a number of mint-condition headsets were sold for between $2,575 and $3,348.