Apple’s mixed reality headset, Vision Pro, will be available in additional countries outside the US starting Friday.
Australian customers can buy the headset starting Friday morning. Once stores open, Vision Pro will also be available in stores in Canada, France, Germany and the UK.
This comes after the headset debuted in Asian markets of China, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore on June 28.
Customers are booking appointments for demos of Vision Pro at one of Apple’s largest stores, on Regent Street in London. Apple has long allowed potential customers to test other devices in stores, but the Vision Pro is a new product with a hefty price tag.
Established hardware like the iPhone can usually be easily preordered online without much hassle or real-world testing. But the Vision Pro demo is an opportunity for Apple to convince people that they should pay $3,499 for the headset, which is much more expensive than other mass-market headsets.
Bryan Ma, vice president of International Data Corporation, said there’s no question Vision Pro is generating a lot of excitement because it’s “a relatively new product category that is far from mainstream.” It’s also “coming from Apple, whose implementation is far ahead of the competition.”
But the challenge is whether Apple can maintain the initial enthusiasm and turn it into sustainable sales, Ma said.
“That will be difficult given not only the currently sky-high price tag, but also the fact that the ecosystem of applications and use cases is still evolving,” Ma said in emailed comments.
In the first quarter, Meta maintained its top position in the mixed/virtual reality headset market, but Apple’s recent entry has pushed it into second place, according to an IDC report released June 18. ByteDance, Xreal and HTC also made it into the top five.
“Both Meta’s Quest 3 and the Vision Pro helped educate users and enticed developers to create mixed reality content, blending the digital and physical worlds,” said IDC.
“Unfortunately, this has come at a premium for users,” IDC added, citing the higher price.
According to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of TF International Securities, Apple has lowered its 2024 sales forecast for Vision Pro from 700,000-800,000 units to about 400,000-450,000 units. Kuo attributed the drop in delivery forecast to a drop in demand.
“We’re expecting Apple to ship about 400,000 units this year, almost half of which will be outside of the U.S. That compares to a total market of 7.3 million units. This can ramp up more quickly if we start to see hardware prices come down and utility from the applications increase,” said Ma.