Hands on With Apple’s Vision Pro: The Opposite of Disappearing

FaceTime would be, in theory, an opportunity to create an extremely human experience in mixed-reality headsets. In my demo, it didn’t achieve this. The internal cameras within the headset are capable of capturing and regurgitating your face in digital form, a hyperrealistic digital twin that appears before the person you’re chatting with. In my FaceTime demo I chatted with the digital twin of an Apple employee who cheerfully talked me through some of these features. But she seemed disembodied. She was real, but she was also not. I’m afraid I don’t even recall her name. 

While using some apps, the room dimmed around me, which is one of the more compelling parts of Vision Pro. It either auto-magically dims when you’re using certain apps, or it can be manually dimmed using the little dial on your headset. Tap into one of the virtual “Environments” Apple seeded on the demo unit, and the Scandinavian normcore living room would disappear around me. Open Apple TV+ and air-tap into a stereoscopic video reel, then select Cinematic mode, and you might as well be in the Alamo Drafthouse. This is what Apple seems to think is the essence of making this a platform versus a product: You don’t have to choose between AR and VR. Your app can be anything you want it to be.

Vision Pro shone in the entertainment category, especially because it was dynamic. I first watched a clip of Avatar 2 in 3D. Then, in a teaser of a new dinosaur-focused series from director Jon Favreau, a dinosaur stomped dangerously close to where I stood in the room based on the positioning of my sensor-filled headset. A digital butterfly fluttered around the room before landing on my outstretched finger. These experiences could absolutely happen in other AR or VR headsets. The difference is that Apple has the ability to entice Hollywood directors and app makers to build them. 

Vision Quest

Apple’s Vision Pro headset has the potential to eventually mainstream AR in a way that other face computers haven’t, simply because it’s Apple. Already developers are expressing excitement about the headset. And again, at $3,500, the first units of the Vision Pro will likely be snapped up by developers and gadget lovers with disposable income. 

But the Vision Pro is also unlike almost every other modern Apple product in one crucial way: It doesn’t disappear. In fact, it does the opposite. It rests on your face and shields your eyes, sensory organs that are a crucial part of the lived human experience. The same is true of every other heads-up display in the world, whether it’s a pair of AR glasses, an industrial-focused headset, or fully immersive VR goggles. The experience can be remarkable and surreal, for sure; but it requires a suspension of disbelief and a sacrifice of autonomy. Even Apple can’t out-design its way out of what is fundamentally an obtrusive technology. 

Every successful Apple product of the past two decades has disappeared into our lives in some way—the iPhone into our pockets, the iPad into our purses, the Apple Watch living on our wrists, and the AirPods resting in our ears. Wearing the Vision Pro for hours on end will call into question what it means to compute, but also, what it means to live in the real world. My forehead felt cool when I took the Vision Pro off after around 30 minutes, a testament to Apple’s considerate design. But my face also breathed with relief, the way it has after using other heads-up displays. The air feels more real out here.