After an eight hour flight, I can say that Apple has largely nailed the Vision Pro use-case of movie watching on a plane. But a few key improvements stand to make it more widely appealing.

Nobody looks forward to an eight hour flight. Whether it’s sleeping or reading or working, people want a way to pass the time and distract themselves from the noisy cabin, turbulence, and the general feeling of being packed into a metal tube like sardines.

The seat-back screen—with its selection of movies and TV shows—offers minor refuge from this chaotic environment.

I’m someone who really appreciates ‘cinematic spectacle’—you know, the movies that have the direction and action that really deserve a big screen and great audio.

While the movie selection on a plane is usually not half bad, over the years I have regularly avoided watching some movies I actually wanted to watch, because I felt they deserved much more than the experience I’d get from a small, low quality seat-back screen.

If only I could somehow bring my own movie theater on the plane.

Well, it turns out that’s a thing now.

Vision Pro on a Plane

Using a Vision Pro combined with AirPods Pro 2 on an international flight was a phenomenal experience viewing that can reasonably be described as bringing your own movie theater onto the plane.

While there’s still some obvious ways to improve the experience of using the headset on a plane, I was blown away at how it managed to make me practically unaware of the plane I was on.

This whole thing really only works well because Apple has done a few things to make sure the use-case is not just theoretical, but actually considered from end-to-end.

For one, Vision Pro has a special tracking mode called Travel Mode (not to be confused with Airplane Mode) which allows the headset to keep the floating screen locked in place in front of you even though the airplane is moving. Without it, the headset would detect the motions of the plane and cause the screen to go flying off behind you at worst, or slowly drift out of place at best.

Travel mode managed to keep the screen perfectly locked in place in front of me, with no drift throughout the entire duration of the movie. I put the screen out in front of me and made it 20 feet large.

This would have otherwise created a stereoscopic disparity by going ‘through’ the seats in front of me, turning Vision Pro’s digital crown to add an immersive backdrop behind the screen (which fades out to the passthrough view at the edges) worked perfectly to prevent that. It ended up looking like a soft portal to another dimension was open right in front of me… with a huge TV just on the other side.

Then there’s simply the quality of the display. When it comes to movie viewing, it’s not just resolution that matters. The headset’s HDR capability combined with micro OLED (which offers true blacks) really makes videos shine.

But none of this would matter if it wasn’t easy to find and transfer high quality video content onto the headset.

Luckily it was as simple as opening the Apple TV app before my flight where I downloaded Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)—at 4K resolution with surround sound, HDR, and in 3D—for offline viewing on my headset.

Lost in the Best Way

What’s crazy is that despite being stuck in a plane in an economy seat, this was the best way I’ve ever watched Mad Max on any screen. The quality was great. The 3D is better than what you get in a movie theater, and so is the contrast. Using AirPods Pro 2 also gave me a really impressive audio experience, and I couldn’t believe how well the noise cancellation isolated me from the noise of the plane.

With a high quality video on a huge screen, great sound with noise cancellation, and a movie with constant action, I was lost in an audio-visual reality that practically made me forget I was on a plane. In fact I have to admit that I was so lost in the film that I forgot to capture and screenshots for this article!

But I wasn’t completely unaware… on purpose. I didn’t dial the immersive environment up to 100% (which would have completely surrounded me and made it look like I wasn’t in the plane at all), which meant I could still look off to the side and see what was happening in the cabin so I didn’t need to worry that I’d miss a drink when the flight attendants came by.

Not for Everyone (yet)

The movie watching experience I had with Vision Pro on the plane was vastly better than what I’ve ever had from a seatback screen or a laptop.

But it’s not a perfect experience and there’s still some things that need to be improved before everyone would want to watch movies on the plane this way.

First are the obvious things. Vision Pro is big, and even bigger when it’s in a travel case. At this price, it’s not the kind of headset you’re just going to squeeze into a backpack without any protection. The headset in its travel case took up like 80% of the space in the backpack I carried onto the plane.

When I was ready to pull the headset out, it was fairly clunky to pull the case out of my backpack, unzip and fold it open in my lap, then pull out the headset and battery before getting the headset plugged in and putting the case back under my seat. In the cramped space of an economy seat, it’s a bit of a juggling act.

The only real fix for this is a smaller and more affordable headset. And even better if they can eventually ditch the battery pack. But in the interim, I could easily see an airline offering Vision Pro headsets built into a compartment in first class seats. Not only could these be permanently powered through a tether, but passengers wouldn’t need to carry a bulky case with them onto the plane to get a great movie watching experience.

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Although hand-tracking worked incredibly well considering how dark the cabin was, Vision Pro would occasionally give me a ‘Tracking Lost’ message when I shuffled around a little too much—likely a limitation of Travel Mode. Luckily Apple thoughtfully pauses the movie when this happens, and in three or four seconds the tracking would come back and the movie would start playing again.

This happened a handful of times as I watched the movie. Because I understand the tech and the challenge of tracking the headset in this worst-case environment, it didn’t bother me that much. But for a normal person this would probably feel like quite a disruption to the movie experience if it happened multiple times.

Visual and audio isolation is the point if you’re using a headset on a plane, but this can make it hard for someone to get your attention. Passthrough is of course helpful here, but the field-of-view is tighter than your natural field-of-view, making it harder to see things out of the corner of your eye. This makes it more difficult for someone to get your attention (like a fellow passenger who wants to politely interrupt you so they can get out of the seats and to the bathroom).

And of course there’s battery life. After watching the full two hours of Mad Max: Fury Road, I was left with 35% battery on Vision Pro. Although that means I had another hour to squeeze in a show or two, only being able to watch one full length movie on an eight hour flight is an obvious and unfortunate limitation.

And yes I could have brought a big external battery and plugged it into Vision Pro’s battery to extend the runtime, but now we’re talking about adding more bulk, wires, and juggling to the equation.

Personally I was willing to put up with these various hassles to watch a movie with excellent audio and visual quality on a plane. And I’ll do it again.

But I recognize that not everyone cares that much about what a movie looks and sounds like. For those people, Vision Pro is just not convenient enough for the value it would bring them. But once it gets smaller (and losses the battery pack), this use-case will become appealing for a much larger group of people.

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Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."
  • Nevets

    I think the xreal Air (original or new) via Samsung Dex will do the job far more effectively and practicably, at a fraction of the price, with fit-for-purpose resolution and black contrast, and with none of the hardware bulk issues mentioned. The Apple hmd is simply not yet a worthwhile contender for this purpose and is only being tested in this way because it exists and it is from Apple.

    • ApocalypseShadow

      It’s only a preliminary device before the main one comes. Right now it’s luxury. Apple is going to release the second version that will be more enticing and it definitely won’t be $3,500. It’ll be low enough to the point that’s it’s like buying an iPhone in price. And we’ve seen Apple users spend that grand or more for their devices. Not so much for the competition. Even Facebook found that $1,500 wasn’t flying off the shelf as easily as an Apple product around that same price.

      The Air glasses are very nice from what I’ve seen. But all you can do is use it as a screen. Vision Pro does more than that. And the Air devices aren’t cheap. The devices they’re compatible with aren’t cheap. Not much of a fraction when the masses still won’t be spending that type of money from an unknown company that has no consumer hardware following. Similar to those video glasses we had years ago. And consumers weren’t that interested or there would be more consumers using them today. Even Sony found their HZ-1 headsets didn’t go anywhere with consumers. And they were some of the best.

      If the Air devices had more market presence, could link up to any cellphone and display your content while offering hand tracking, I’d be right there with you. Right now I can’t fully agree.

      • Daca123

        The second version will def be more enticing, but Apple doesn’t really do cheap/low margin. I’d be surprised if you could get a VPro for much under 3k this decade.

        • Nevets

          Of course it’ll go down significantly in price when there’s more than half a decade to play with. But like you say, it’ll never be bargain basement as that’s not Apple.

        • Christian Schildwaechter

          Apple doesn’t do cheap/low margin. But outside the niche MacPro/Pro Display XDR for high end Final Cut users, they don’t do “low numbers” either. The first Apple Vision is called “Pro”, but positioned as an end user media consumption/communication device, not a professional niche tool. They certainly see “spatial computing” as a consumer mass market, which will not work at USD 3000, or even USD 2000.

          AVP manufacturing costs are estimated as USD ~1600, and lowering them in the near future should be rather easy. USD 500-700 (depending on estimate) are just for the micro-OLED displays, manufactured by Sony in small numbers with low yield. The currently low yield for both displays and AVP itself will increase with more experience, and Apple is already talking to Chinese display manufacturers, so at least the insane display price should drop very fast.

          Apple’s 55% margin for AVP is much higher than on iPhone. The first “prototype” AVP might cost USD 3500 simply to lower initial demand, because Sony can only deliver 900K displays for 450K AVP in 2024, and apparently refused to increase their production facilities, knowing that Apple plans to switch to cheaper microOLEDs from BOE/SeeYa. Future Apple Vision models without similar supply constraints could come at much lower prices, allowing for much larger unit sales. Not in iPhone numbers, not within the next two years, but surely before 2030.

      • Nevets

        Sure, I hear you, but my only point was to compare the AVP (based on spec knowledge – I haven’t tried it) with the Xreal Air, for the sole use case of watching movies on a plane. To my mind, the Air seemingly beats the AVP in most metrics, particularly price, comfort and practicality. And as an Air owner with a compatible (DEX) phone, I can confirm that it has good, clear picture quality for a fraction of the cost of the AVP.

        • Ben Lang

          46 degree FoV, a semi-transparent low contrast virtual screen, and 1,920×1,080 total resolution is a lot of downside. It being compact is definitely nice though!

          • Nevets

            To reiterate… I’m responding specifically to the article’s use case of watching a movie on a plane. Air (with clip-on covers if needed) gives a very large and cinematic screen (the FOV is perfectly adequate for this), a completely passable resolution, better comfort from what I gather, no sweatiness, low weight and a fraction of the cost…

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            The screen built into the seat before you also has a passable resolution (for the distance you are watching it from), is more comfortable to “wear”, not even blocking the air condition to your face, weights nothing on your head and comes free with your ticket. It is perfectly adequate for watching a movie. The FoV sucks though.

            There is no one-size-fits-all solution or a perfect cost/benefit ratio. The Xreal glasses are very neat, I’d like a pair to connect to my Steamdeck instead of watching movies. I haven’t bought one because it’s not worth it for me for this limited use case, but for others they may be the perfect match. I’m not planing on getting a first generation AVP either, but for someone else just the improved resolution, color accuracy and adjustable immersion while watching a movie on a plane might be worth it. The vast majority of people will stick to the built-in screen or use their phone/laptop, because they “will do the job far more effectively and practicably.”

          • Nevets

            Errrr… I think the topic is the relative usefulness of HMDs on a plane. The likes of airline seat screens and Nokia N95s weren’t really part of the comparison.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            The seat-back screen—with its selection of movies and TV shows—offers minor refuge from this chaotic environment.

            At least the article makes the comparison.

            I think the xreal Air (original or new) via Samsung Dex will do the job far more effectively and practicably, at a fraction of the price, with fit-for-purpose resolution and black contrast, and with none of the hardware bulk issues mentioned

            I was reacting esp. to the “do the job far more effectively and practicably”, as this is a completely subjective assessment based on your personal comfort, feature and price preference. There is obviously a wide spectrum, with many people at each end of it. Ben knows the AVP and the Xreal glasses, and apparently prefers the AVP. You consider the Xreal experience good enough that the AVP is very unlikely to add enough benefit to justify its price. Most people have never consider buying a HMD for watching movies, as they are fine with small screens for a few hours, or are already used to watching movies on phones.

            If you had phrased it as “far more effectively and practicably for me“, making clear that this is a personal preference, not a universally applying statement, I wouldn’t have responded to it.

            The Apple hmd is simply not yet a worthwhile contender for this purpose and is only being tested in this way because it exists and it is from Apple.

            This is obviously false. YOU may consider it not a worthwhile contender for your needs, but others may find it worth its high price. Which is why it was tested by someone who actually thinks it is. Not just because it exists and is from Apple.

          • kraeuterbutter

            46 degree FoV for watching movies is not that bad i would say…

            THX, the company founded by George Lucas that sets audio and video
            standards for cinemas and home theater systems, has specific
            recommendations for the ideal field of view.
            for Watching movies they say: 36 degree

            so: 46 degree is not THAT small, when considered for watching movies

            of course there are other aspects.. (is there tracking? than you need headroom)

      • But you already have a Quest 3. What is going on here? Apple blindness???

    • Lucidfeuer

      50° fixed FOV is an horrendous experience, I’d rather use a Quest

  • impurekind

    Yeah, and the most frustrating thing for me here, as someone who simply cannot afford a Vision Pro, is that Meta really should have had pretty much all of this on its Quest headsets for a long time already. The fact I still cannot just go into my Quest 3, load up the stereoscopic 3D version of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and watch away [on a plane or whenever] like I’m in my own private virtual cinema is just kinda bonkers. How in the living Christ did Meta let that get by them. :-o

    • STL

      Just tried a spatial iPhone 15 video from YouTube and it didn’t work at all on Quest 3. Thought they wanted to fix that?

    • kraeuterbutter

      what do you mean?

      you can get 3D content, even highest quality ISOs to the quest3

      of course: not the colors and SDE-freeness like on he vision Pro with its high-ress oled-screens
      but:
      resolution itself is (nearly) enough, because 3D-Moviels only have 1080p for each eye

      watched Avater 2 two weeks ago with the Quest3
      tip:enhance the contrast of the quest3-screens in the “Bedienhilfen”-Settings
      its a little bit hidden, but it makes blacks a lot more black

    • MeowMix

      Meta tried this way back in the early Rift and GO years. While many of us liked it, the ‘Gamer Bros’ all complained about ‘WhErEs MaH GaMeS!1!!”. Did you forget about the Maroon 5 Oculus GO TV commercials ? lol. For example, Venues started out as a really cool experience, where Oculus hosted weekly big studio movies that host hundreds of viewers at a time; it was pretty cool !

      It’s good that Oculus started as a gaming company, but that also led them down a path where they didn’t invest more in video and other entertainment options. Time to divest some of the focus away from the gamers and more into general computing. Now that video watching is becoming a thing of renewed interest, hopefully we get a revamped Oculus Videos and Venues experience.

      • Christian Schildwaechter

        The problem is the business model. 80% of the Go’s use was for “media consumption”, which would be great for a company like Sony also selling movie content, one reasons why Sony Japan didn’t want SIE CEO Jim Ryan to cancel the PSVR2. But unless Meta can charge users for every video streamed, they’d basically sell subsidized Netflix players. And the VR market is too small for Meta to negotiate favorable deals with large movie studios/distributers themselves.

        Even current Quest games aren’t attractive for Meta, as all they get is 30% from occasional app and DLC sales. What they really want is a Fortnite like platform, where people spend lots of time with their friends, buy non-essential items for social status via micro-transactions, and participate in events like concerts. Fortnite is the most successful single virtual world that’s not just a large multiplayer game, generating USD ~5bn in revenue each year since 2017, with Epic no longer willing to give 30% to Apple/Google.

        The goal is to get people to spend a lot of time on the platform, not only on movies or games, but to just hang out with others. And profit from lots of small service transactions. For this the platform/metaverse has to simulate a real/rich world, otherwise people will get bored/leave, and the Go experience was too passive for this.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      The problem with the Quest 3 not able to load up the stereoscopic 3D version of The Super Mario Bros movie has all to do with legal content. There is no streaming service that actually provides 3D movies (at least not that I’m aware of), and Meta doesn’t sell movies in their store.
      So the only way to watch 3D movies in your headset would be using illegally downloaded movies, and then you know why Meta hasn’t built a videoplayer themselves that could play 3D movies.
      But there are players on the meta (applab) store that can: 4XVR or try looking for others.

      • g-man

        You could always play video you legally ripped from disc. Skybox is another good video player.

        • Andrew Jakobs

          99 out of 100 don’t rip their discs. So for Meta to create a videoplayer capable of playing ripped/illegal movies isn’t high on their agenda, not until they have their own movie/series store options. Thanx for pointing out another player for the Quest 3.

      • Arno van Wingerde

        But I think for most people this is about watching 2D movies while traveling, not about 3D/VR content.

      • Hussain X

        You’re forgetting Oculus TV (maybe called Meta TV now) can play 3D movies. The old Oculus Video Gallery could also play 3d movies. Of course after conversion to SBS format.

  • STL

    Sorry. An Apple marketing story?
    1. a Quest 3 serves the same purpose, I‘m using it at every flight.
    2. You sweat profusely under these AVP diving goggles, while you now get well-ventilated facials for Quest 3.
    3. pretty expensive for just watching movies… what else can one do with AVP?

    • VR5

      AVP sure is expensive but the spatial personas they just added this week are very impressive and basically one of the usecases Zuck demonstrated as his vision of the Metaverse at the Connect where he changed the parent company’s name to Meta.

      Basically you can do all things you can do on Apple systems with people far away being present with them on giant virtual screens, as well as play games.

      I mean Meta actually want to be accessible and reach a wide audience, Apple on the other hand figured the only way to catch up is to provide proofs of concept for the rich. Not the worst they could have done and it does demonstrate how the tech is worthwhile.

      • STL

        Tried spatial video the first time yesterday on a Quest 3 and immediately bought an iPhone 15 Pro Max. Spatial cameras and viewers indeed is the next big thing.

        • VR5

          I am considering getting a new smart phone for spatial recording for the first time in years; I was fine with using my S8 forever but spatial videos got me excited again.

          BUT they’re so expensive and for that price I’d like proper VR (spherical) recording. Well I guess I’m being unrealistic.

          What is nice though that more and more people will now own devices that can make spatial recordings so I can watch those recorded by other people. They’re not as impressive as spherical videos (no presence) but as they’re framed they also don’t require new directing paradigms and well no experimentation. Resolution is also very clean since they’re framed and don’t need to cover a huge FoV.

          Basically 3d cinema is now accessible to ordinary people for their real life recordings. Spatial video will be to the internet what Avatar was for cinema.

          • STL

            Please consider the fact that spatial video is sharp, while VR videos aren’t. I’m playing with VR cameras since 7 years, I have never seen a sharp solution. Also: VR is not necessarily 3D. It can be, but this is very rare.

          • VR5

            I did mention the sharpness of spatial videos as an advantage in my reply (“Resolution is also very clean since they’re framed and don’t need to cover a huge FoV.”)

            As for VR not necessarily being 3D, or this being rare, that is a weird claim to make. All VR is 3D, it’s only immersive media where some vendors are trying to sell monoscopic videos as VR. Audience disagrees and monoscopic content has been the minority for a long time.

            Although I have to admit that high resolution monoscopic immersive video can be pretty good actually and for drone flights where everything tends to be very far away 3D doesn’t add a lot. So monoscopic immersive video can be worthwhile sometimes. But there is a reason why this isn’t referred to as VR by most.

          • STL

            Sorry, yes you did. I might just been frustrated by my seven year luckless search for a high resolution 360° camera, delivering really sharp results Not even if you pay 40,000 USD, you get a clean picture..
            Yet suddenly there is a spatial solution opening up a whole new range of possibilities VR couldn’t deliver so far.

          • VR5

            I wouldn’t go that far but for good image quality you need a camera in the 4 digits (Calf makes an affordable one) and good lighting, whereas with 3D framed cameras you can get good results for under 400 (Kandao QooCam). More importantly they’re added to smartphones now, although not quite as good quality wise yet.

            I have a Vuze XR I bought for €430 5 years ago, which can do 4K at 60fps or 5K at 30fps, either 360 monoscopic or 180 stereo. For the price it is actually pretty good but not good enough that I really ended up using it much.

            Framed 3D has the potential to be accessible for the average user. Spherical is better for presence but simply out of range for non enthusiast consumers.

          • Arno van Wingerde

            I maybe sharp, and 3D but it is not VR: you cannot really change position and look at the object from another angle: the info is simply not there.

        • That’s what I thought… about 9 years ago with the first voxel video experiments using the Kinect. It raised a few ripples and mostly vanished.

          12 years I was taking 3D videos and snapshots with the Evo 3D, which is a cellphone with a 3D camera AND a 3D screen. And I even found a service that printed lenticular photos, so I had 3D snapshots. I love them, but nobody else seemed to care.

          in 2010, 14 years ago, the 3DS gave you a handheld gaming system with a glasses-free 3D screen. Very impressive. People turned the 3D off.

          3D Recording has never left a niche community and I’m thinking it never will. Even if a scummy company like Apple uses it’s patents to stop all other phone makers for using LADAR in their devices, they are only stopping a feature that’s never been more then a novelty to it’s users.

          Apple is behind the curve on everything they release, and always more expensive with less features. 3D video curve always slides into a brick wall of consumer ambivalence.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Not really a marketing story. As the image quality of the AVP is just much better for watching (3D) movies. But it sure as F better be for a device that is 7 times more expensive.
      It’s just undeiable that the Quest 3 isn’t as good for movie watching due to the lesser displays, but for the price you can get it, it sure is a decent way to watch a movie. It’s all about the price difference. If you factor out price, the AVP is just the winner for watching movies.

    • Thank you, I was scrolling through the comments hoping to see somebody mention ANY of this.

      Also, took me a moment when you said AVP. I was thinking, Alien Vs Predator, on account of the Apple’s stuff looking so dumb.

  • sfmike

    The Vision Pro is the best home movie watching experience period and the 3D capabilities make it truly outstanding. Yes, the Quest 3 can serve the same purpose but the visual fidelity just can’t compare to the micro OLED hyper detail and color the AVP brings to life. It’s interesting how Apple seems to market the AVP mostly to women as this article seems to have not been able to find pics of a man wearing the headset. I guess Apple knows who has all the money now.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Well, it better be much better experience as it’s still 7 times more expensive as a Quest 3. So it’s not really a fair comparison. A 100″ OLED TV also gives a better experience as watching it on 50″ LCD screen.

  • MosBen

    I’m betting that Apple will have a consumer targeted VR product out by Holidays 2025 or early 2026. And in addition to being cheaper it’ll sand off the roughest edges of the experience. Seems like we may be on the cusp of these devices really levelling up.

    • You have heard of the Quest 3, right?

      • MosBen

        Yes. And? I’m sure that Meta will put out a new headset in the next 2-3 years that will also be technically impressive. That doesn’t really have anything to do with my comment.

  • Thanks for reporting your experience and it’s very cool that for you watching a movie on the AVP was like going to the cinema. Anyway, airlines should be very careful with people using VR, especially for safety reasons… when you watch a movie on the seats computer, every time there is an official announcement, the movie gets paused. If you are totally immersed in the AVP, you may lose all the announcements, including the important ones like dangers, turbolence, or info about immigration. I think headset manufacturers should work with airlines to try to understand how to cooperate on this.

    • kraeuterbutter

      for that reason also sleeping on a airplane should be forbidden !

      ;-)

      • Genius! Thank you!

        All I could think is, “What safety reasons?”. In the event I need to fly the plane? If S**T happens, you all die. Is that safe enough? You can at least enjoy the final minutes of a movie as you spiral down on your flaming deathtrap.

        Safety on the an airplane, much like security at the front gates, is all for show. If something goes wrong, ENJOY THE RIDE! LOL

    • Nevets

      Hey, anything that diverts your attention from an impending crash is a good thing, no? You’re here for a good time, not for a long time

  • Andrew Jakobs

    Especially the 3D would be a reason for me to use a VR headset, as it is different as wearing a shutterglass/polarised glasses to watch the movie.
    But for now, the current affordable headsets still have a too low resolution compared to my projector on a 118″ screen, so it will take a few years before I’m gonna replace my projector for viewing movies, but I can’t wait untill I can watch a 3D movie with a headset (3D with DLP-Link still has it’s flaws with bright scenes).

    • ApocalypseShadow

      Lol. But the idea is being on a plane. Of course high quality projectors and 4-8K TVs might still be better for home viewing with surround sound and group watching on the couch.

      What does home have to do with a plane?

      • Arno van Wingerde

        Andrew is just mentioning another use of VR use to watch films, apart from the traveling experience of the article.

  • Traph

    Quest 3 (or Pro) could do the same thing (at lower fidelity and with a lack of legal ways to get content or course).

    Except they don’t have travel mode for some reason. Not a huge deal if you turn on 3dof mode – but then you lose access to Passthrough. Frustrating choices all around.

  • g-man

    I should hope so for the price!

    Q3 video players should emulate AVP’s partial immersion facility; that sounds perfect for planes for the reasons you describe.

    Enjoy your time wherever you went :)

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      The problem would be that all the extra processing the MR passthrough requires to correct the perspective has a serious impact on battery life of the Quest 3. The AVP has a dedicated signal processor, the R1, running in parallel to the M2 SoC, so passthrough actually keeps working even if the main processor crashes/has to reboot. It is probably very optimized for this tasks, as it is always-on, while enabling MR taxes the XR2 Gen 2 enough that developers cannot select the highest performance level when using MR in their apps.

      The partial immersion might be either lighter on compute, because less of the camera image has to be processed, or heavier, because real and virtual geometry have to be merged. Virtual cinema is usually an application with low performance requirements, as most of the work is done by dedicated video decoders that are extremely efficient, with the resulting image just projected onto a plane with some ornamental environment. This allows watching a whole movie before the battery runs out, even on the Quest 3 with worse battery life than the Quest 2 due to the pancake lenses losing ~90% of the light, requiring a much brighter display. This might no longer work if enabled MR turns virtual cinema into an app with high performance requirements.

      • Dragon Marble

        Battery life is not a concern for seated experiences. That’s how I use my Vision Pro: always plugged in.

      • g-man

        This is all true but videos players already support MR mode so it would just be adding a variable mask option. It does eat battery but you can always plug in if need be.

  • ViRGiNCRUSHER

    I dont know if I would wear my AVP on a plane. I look like a dope wearing it around the house not sure I wanna do that on a plane lol

  • Lucidfeuer

    This sounds like a disguised advertisement. The weight and the fact that you have to be constantly plugged through an external proprietary battery to do exactly what the Quest 3 can do (granted you’d have to download the 3D movies) untethered is a joke.

  • MrJonty

    I use the viture AR glasses (along with it’s Android tv neckband) for a similar but much cheaper experience. They are smaller too so easier to carry on. And also plug into the steamdeck for gaming as well. All vr headsets are way too heavy and clampy to wear for a while in a plane IMHO

  • Rob

    Someone needs to be quite a geek to put this on his head in a plane among so many people. I mean VR is far from mainstream yet. I would feel pretty embarrassed.