Sure, upgrade the hardware and fix the inevitable hardware issues from v1.0, but I don't believe this will significantly expand the Vision Pro buyer pool. In fact, with the first year surge of sales from early adopters and developers now behind it, what AVP really needs in 2025 is a larger number of compelling use cases for its unique set of capabilities. Based on Mark Gurman's reporting, it seems that Apple may be in a conundrum in that regard: it's very expensive to develop for VisionOS and the buyer pool for software remains very small, which is a very poor combination for attracting developers to the platform. (My answer to that for Apple is pretty simple: you're sitting on a mountain of cash, so make it worth their while to develop for VisionOS in the early going. Development is key to its long-term future.)
My own experience with AVP: I went in for the demo at my Apple Store, and there's no question its capabilities seem like magic and are extraordinarily impressive. In fact, if you haven't done a demo, you really should. But then the question: would I buy this, even if it were priced much lower? No, because I simply don't see a need for it amidst my current iMac/Macbook/iPad hardware. I don't have a compelling use case for it. It may well be that AVP finds much greater success as an enterprise device rather than with average consumers--we shall see. But I remain very excited that Apple brought AVP to market and has the patience and cash necessary to sustain it through these early years. As far as a mass market headset for media consumption, I'm happy to let Meta have that so-called "business" and continue to rack up $1.5 billion in losses every single month selling hardware at a loss with no end in sight.
Interestingly, after I posted the above 2 paragraphs, I received this week's Power On newsletter from Mark Gurman, which featured this headline: The Vision Pro's First Killer App Has Arrived. This is an unexpected declaration from Mark who has been more than a little critical of AVP. His article continued:
"Apple markets the Vision Pro as a standalone device (complete with powerful chips and a $3,500 price tag), but one of its best features is the ability to serve as a Mac external monitor. In June, Apple announced plans to make that feature even better, bringing a virtual curved monitor mode to the default size, as well as offering new wide and ultrawide monitor options.
The company released a beta version of these capabilities this past week, and they are a game changer. In my view, the features represent the first true killer app for the Vision Pro. They provide a high-resolution Mac external monitor with what feels like an infinite amount of screen real estate. Before these new modes arrived, I was only using my Vision Pro occasionally to watch movies. Now, I’m back to at least trying to use it every workday.
Apple should be marketing the new ultrawide display modes in a major way. It’s that good."
