The Vision Pro made a big splash when it launched earlier this year, but a new report shows just how quickly interest has died down.
It’s only been out for eight months, but The Information is reporting that production is being suspended next month because of “weak demand,” with some suppliers having “already halted manufacturing components since early summer.”
https://t.co/rAAxAGDLEv
Apple could suspend production of the Vision Pro as soon as next month amid weak demand, and some suppliers have already halted manufacturing components since early summer. Check out my latest scoop with @QianerLiu for @theinformation
— Wayne Ma (@waynema) October 23, 2024
The Vision Pro was never meant to be a mainstream product. Very few products that cost $3,499 really can be. Apple hasn’t been afraid of admitting this, but if it’s true that Apple has already put a pause on manufacturing, that spells bad news for the future of this technology.
The report comes just days after CEO Tim Cook gave an interview that acknowledges this fact pretty bluntly.
“At $3,500, it’s not a mass-market product,” Cook says in the interview with The Wall Street Journal. “Right now, it’s an early-adopter product. People who want to have tomorrow’s technology today—that’s who it’s for. Fortunately, there’s enough people who are in that camp that it’s exciting.”
That makes the situation sound a bit more promising than The Information’s sources say, but we do know that Apple has plans to follow up the Vision Pro with future headsets, including both a cheaper entry-level version and true Vision Pro 2. Last we heard, the cheaper Vision was scheduled for 2025, while the Vision Pro 2 would land in 2026.
On the other hand, this summer The Information reported that Apple had already discontinued work on the Vision Pro 2 to favor development of the cheaper model.
Regardless of how you slice it, though, it’s certainly worrying that the Vision Pro doesn’t have enough demand to continue production, especially for a product that won’t get updated every year. Meta has suspended production on the Quest Pro as well, with a possible release date for the Quest Pro 2 being held until 2027.
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