Meta / Oculus Quest Pro Release Date Officially Announced!

So, tell me, where do you normally get your news? When it comes to gaming or technology we’d typically look towards showcases like Gamescom or E3. Perhaps, larger companies like Meta and Apple we’re more likely to look towards their own annual conferences. On this occasion, both Meta’s conference and more recently, Gamescom have passed by with some tech reveals but no big release date announcements. Mark Zuckerburg seems to like to do things differently.

We all found out together that the next iteration of the Quest will release on or around October 25^th this year. That’s right, October 25, mark it in your diaries. How did we find out this nugget of information I hear you ask? Well, on the Joe Rogan podcast of course. The founder of one of the world’s largest social media platforms decides to drop the biggest announcement of the year for VR on a podcast. It seems beyond belief but it is still music to our ears.

The Joe Rogan Podcast – What Other Revelations about The Meta / Oculus Quest Pro did Zuckerberg reveal?

So, in the long-form interview between Joe and Mark, we did find out a few more nuggets of information. The focus in general was on Meta and not necessarily on virtual reality but Joe did bounce back and forth on the topic. The interview as a whole was fascinating, and I would encourage all to watch or listen to it if you have the time, link at the bottom. But to focus solely on the Quest, here is what we learned.

• October 25^th Release Date – What we all wanted to know. Many speculated that it would be pushed to early 2023, so this news comes as a very pleasant surprise. Not missing the Christmas rush is a smart move for Meta as long as they can get enough units on the shelves for us lucky consumers.

• No Name Yet – Yes, it’s still confusing. Is it Quest 3? The Cambria? Maybe it’s going to be known as the Quest 2 Pro? Well, we still don’t know but with the ever-approaching release date, we’re bound to find out soon.

• Price – Again, not a certainty but it’s heavily rumored to release with a much higher price tag than the Quest 2. Upwards of $800 has been rumored and a quick glance at the spec sheet only helps to back up this price point theory. It doesn’t seem viable to sell below $500 without making a loss, but here’s hoping that we’re wrong. Their recent increase in price for the Quest 2 shows more and more though how unlikely we’ll get our hands on this new edition for a budget price. Time to start saving now!

• No Facebook Account – Meta recently dropped the requirements for using their headsets. You no longer need to link or create a Facebook account in order to use your VR headsets. This is across all their range and will extend to the new headset when it launches in October.

• No Competition – There aren’t too many headsets on the market. The big seller currently is Meta’s own Quest 2. With Sony officially pushing the launch of the PSVR2 to early 2023 the path ahead is clear for Meta. To put it simply, there will be no other worthy competition in the VR headset space for the Holidays. Meta seems set to clean up come Christmas time 2022.

Rumored Specs for the Meta / Oculus Quest Pro

As team Meta works on a number of VR headset projects at once, it’s unclear just what technology they plan to stick in their finished product. That said, a source close to Meta Ming-Chi Kuo believes that we can expect to see the following come October:

• Mini LED Displays for the Meta / Oculus Quest Pro – The visuals will be handled by much smaller flatter LED lenses which he refers to as pancake lenses. This takes up much less space and allows for a smaller, sleeker headset design.

• Meta / Oculus Quest Pro will have 16 Cameras – The headset will come with no less than 16 mounted cameras internal and external. This will allow for even more accurate tracking of positions and movements. It will go a long way toward the improvement of hand tracking, which may negate the need for controllers. Although he does mention that two of these cameras will be on controllers themselves so unlikely we’ll be ditching them altogether.

• The Meta / Oculus Quest Pro will feature Facial Expression Recognition – This tracking technology will allow for facial recognition of expressions to mimic and understand what the user’s face is doing. This will enhance online meetings as digital avatars may express facial movements and lip sync accurately to what a headset user is saying or conveying with their face.

• The Meta / Oculus Quest Pro will feature Eye Tracking – Knowing what the user is focusing on and staring at can allow the GPU to render a smaller area to a high standard and render peripheral vision areas to a lower resolution. This tech relieves the processing work and allows power to go elsewhere.

• The Meta / Oculus Quest Pro will feature a Qualcomm Processor – Kuo predicts that Meta will continue the partnership they have with Qualcomm and the processor will be very similar (but hopefully not too similar) to the processing chip in use on the Quest 2. Qualcomm mainly produces CPUs for mobile phone technology but that’s not an insult. The latest Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 is incredibly powerful and rivals that of Intel or AMD.

Full article covering specs available here.

More News and Announcements for the Meta / Oculus Quest Pro To Come in Early October 2022

That is pretty much all the information we have on our Quest 2 Pro/Cambria/who even knows anymore! Headset. Some facts and plenty of educated assumptions as to what we can expect. One thing is certain though. Meta has more to share with us in early October. Mark Zuckerburg confirmed on the Joe Rogan podcast that there will be a Connect conference in early October and there will be more official announcements.

Being so close to launch, we can expect to see all the specs, price points, and the finished product. I’d also be hopeful to see some previously unannounced launch titles for the headset. Yes, we do all want to see what GTA San Andreas looks like in VR, but I’d also like to see some brand new IPs breathe life into 2022. VR titles have felt a little lacking this year so would be nice to see a stacked last quarter full of goodies. Here’s hoping fingers crossed.

And there we have it, folks. Who needs Google when you have Joe Rogan? If you’d like to check out our more in-depth predictions for the next meta headset, please check it out here.

screenshot from Joe Rogan Experience Podcast

Or if you want to see what else Mark Zuckerburg and Joe Rogan discussed, be sure to check out Joe Rogan’s YouTube channel here.