Meta has added an important puzzle piece to Horizon Worlds, as the company has quietly rolled out its premium digital currency on the social VR platform in the US, UK, and Canada.

Roblox has Robux, Rec Room has Tokens, and Horizon Worlds now has Meta Credits, letting users buy in-world digital goods from creators, such as avatar outfits and access keys to premium worlds. Unlike Quest Cash, Meta Credits can’t be used to buy hardware or accessories, just stuff in Horizon Worlds.

While it’s a big step, this isn’t the official start of the Horizon Worlds economy. Meta has been experimenting with monetization on Horizon Worlds since 2022, allowing users to buy digital goods directly with their local currency. The difference with Meta Credits (like all premium tokens) however is the all-too familiar obfuscation of the amount of real-world money being spent.

Image captured by Road to VR

As seen above, you can buy packs of Meta Credits that come along with various bonus amounts, or go for the straight 10:1 conversion at the lowest 300 Meta Credit tier, which costs $3 and doesn’t come with a bonus amount.

Similar to how Meta rolled out Horizon Worlds itself, the company is keeping a short leash on Meta Credits; they’re only available to users in the US, UK, and Canada for now. Horizon Worlds-supported regions still waiting for Meta Credits include Australia, New Zealand, most of Europe, and many countries in East Asia.

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Meta says parents or guardians of children aged 10-12 (ages vary by region) must approve any purchase requiring a credit card, including the purchase of Meta Credits, through a parent-managed Meta account.

Meta Credits can’t be transferred from one account to another either, meaning they’re tied to your individual account—i.e. not like a cryptocurrency—and can only used within Horizon Worlds, either in Quest or its standard mobile app.

With Meta Credits, Horizon Worlds is taking a definitive step towards building a sustainable virtual economy, although we’ll simply have to wait and see whether it’s enough to strip creators (and users) away from more mature ecosystems, like Roblox, Rec Room, or VRChat.

With Meta’s reach though, there’s more than a good chance we might see Meta Credit gift cards at the checkout aisles as we near Holiday Season.

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Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • BlueScreenJunky

    And so it begins…

  • ViRGiN

    Sign me up, time to invest all of my allowance. I must renew my Meta Quest+ subscription too, but I can't afford both so I need to think carefully which area of Meta I support the most dearly.

    I'm expect an email from Mark Z any day now, thanking me.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      This is neither the original ViRGiN account nor the parody account, but a new one with only one post.

      • xyzs

        It looks stupid enough to be the real one to me anyway.

      • ViRGiN

        The immature incel original ViRGiN deserves all the mockery going their way. My parody account was banned from here (no doubt I took it too far)- if the original ViRGiN is also banished, then there is no need for me to need to continue and my work here is done.

        Nothing stops them using a different account however, although the one-note Valve-hating posting going on will give their identity away pretty quickly. And then they can expect the mockery to continue.

  • flynnstigator

    I’m glad I have QGO and can keep uninstalling this crap right after it auto-downloads. Now I have my router set to block the Q3 from the Internet so it can’t re-download this, Facebook, or Instagram, and can’t phone home with all the juicy advertising data collected from the mic and passthrough cameras. I’ll reconnect once a month for updates, then block again.

    • You actually believe there're people at Meta getting paid to just sit around
      all day and listen to your convos via the Quest 3's microphone …??
      BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

      • kool

        Maybe he's just tired of getting ads based off of recent conversations…

      • flynnstigator

        Yes, and then those people transcribe the conversations on a typewriter and put them in a filing cabinet. What a bizarre mis-characterization.

        You know that almost all of the money Meta/Facebook has ever made is from harvesting and selling everyone’s data, right? You know that they invested $100B into XR because they want more data, right? Or do you think a company whose entire fortune came from collecting our data decided to lose billions selling you a headset full of cameras, sensors, and microphones just so you could have a great gaming experience and live a happy life?

        • Mhm.
          Sometimes, sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar.
          [] ^ )

  • WHICH IS THE SMALLER NUMBER:
    The amount of quarks in a Planck Length?
    The amount of dopes who're actually gonna buy into this dogshite …?? lol
    []^ /

  • Foreign Devil

    So is anybody going to actually buy anything in Horizon Worlds? If they are I'll maybe make some stuff to sell. . but I seriously doubt there will be any buyers. Does VR Chat have a currency?

    • jiink

      VRChat has had currency all year, "VRChat Credits". I've seen it used to do stuff like buy different colors of drums in a world with a drum set. It's not something I've seen much though, and external payment methods are stuff used, so I wouldn't blame anyone if they never noticed its existence

  • The Zuck Bucks

    • ZUCK HAS MANY BUCKS!!
      []^ 0

    • g-man

      More like yuck bucks

  • gothicvillas

    I will not go to Horizons until they get rid of all sick and pervert people who currently inhabit it

    • Scott Hayden

      Well, as long as you don’t come to Horizon, it sounds like your problem solves itself!

    • My friend, that's everywhere online! lol
      IMHO, it's never not been this way.
      But inexpensive & easy-to-use computer-to-computer communications
      makes it seem like: "it's all over the place!" ….

  • Michael Speth

    This is the garbage you support when buying into Meta garbage hardware.