Meta is closing 3 VR studios and shedding roughly 10% of Actuality Labs because it shifts focus from the metaverse to AI wearables, it's subsequent sure-fire, can't-miss concept
Meta chief expertise officer Andrew “Boz” Bosworth stated early in 2025 that the metaverse could possibly be a “legendary misadventure” if the corporate’s Actuality Labs division did not flip issues round that yr in an enormous approach. Effectively, right here we’re in 2026, and it appears to be like just like the mission was not completed: Bloomberg says Meta is starting layoffs of greater than 1,000 Actuality Labs staff and shutting three growth studios because it shifts consideration from VR and the metaverse to its subsequent massive concept, AI wearables and cellphone options.
An inner memo seen by Bloomberg stated roughly 10% of the Actuality Labs workforce will likely be let go in an effort to make the division “extra sustainable.” A Meta consultant stated the cuts signify a part of a beforehand introduced effort to shift funding “from metaverse towards wearables,” including, “We plan to reinvest the financial savings to help the expansion of wearables this yr.”
Actuality Labs has misplaced a staggering amount of cash over the previous a number of years—roughly $50 billion throughout 2020-2024, a income black gap that is solely grown wider since—with out exhibiting any proof of a capability to supply a preferred, precise helpful mainstream product. Which is not to say that the metaverse did not give us something memorable, simply that it was, properly, this:
Meta will proceed to work on the metaverse, based on the report, however with a concentrate on cell gadgets relatively than “absolutely immersive VR headsets” that had been initially anticipated to be on the core of the expertise. VR headset growth may even proceed, however at a lowered tempo.
Meta may even shut three VR growth studios as a part of the cuts: Resident Evil 4 VR developer Armature Studios, Asgard’s Wrath maker Sanzaru Video games, and doubtless the very best recognized of the bunch, Defector developer Twisted Pixel, whose final launch was Deadpool VR in 2025.
PC Gamer senior editor Wes Fenlon stated all the way in which again in 2021 that the metaverse is bullshit and he certain wasn’t flawed. A possible problem for Meta is that its wearables gambit dangers wandering into the identical minefield: $799 for a pair of glasses that look ridiculous and depend on having Meta’s AI put in in your cellphone for performance, a dodgy proposition in its personal proper. (And even once they do work, is that this actually the long run we wish?) On high of that comes the extraordinarily apparent privateness issues these items inevitably engender, and the potential authorized complications and lawsuits which will observe. It is potential that AI wearables will develop into mainstream sometime, however sometime quickly? I would not wager on it—however I additionally would not have sunk greater than $50 billion into regardless of the hell the metaverse was imagined to be.