Apple’s Vision Pro took the world by storm when it went on sale earlier this year and kickstarted the AR-VR mixed reality (also known as XR) market. However, Samsung is not planning to sit still, as it is planning to take the fight directly to Apple by bringing out its first XR headset soon.
The company’s XR headset, which was rumored to be in development for a while now, was finally briefly teased at the Galaxy Unpacked event this month. TM Roh, the President of Samsung’s MX Division, confirmed that Samsung’s XR (extended reality) platform is in the works and is expected to debut later this year.
It is not a secret at this point that Samsung is developing the XR headset by working closely with two of its biggest partners: Qualcomm and Google. According to the report by Business Insider, the internal timeline for the XR headset has now been revealed.
The report states that the XR headset, codenamed “Moohan,” is on track for a definitive debut later this year. The developer version will come out in October 2024 to allow developers to develop applications for Google’s AR software, with a consumer-ready version expected to roll out in early 2025.
The timeline for the introduction of the developer version aligns with Samsung’s annual 2024 Developer Conference, which is confirmed to be held on 3rd October 2024. It seems fit for the company to unveil the developer version’s capabilities and availability information at the event.
We do not know much about the possible hardware the new headset will come with. We can speculate that it will have dual-OLED displays with multiple IR sensors and cameras for hand and eye tracking, and it may be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 2 chipset.
It remains to be seen how Samsung’s XR headset will be seen by developers and consumers alike, especially with the background of Apple’s Vision Pro rapidly losing interest in the public space in the months since its sales began.
