The Apple Vision Pro: Buy or Pass?

Orders for the Apple Vision Pro go live on Friday, and you would think that for the price alone, I wouldn’t even be thinking about getting one. It’s over $3,000 for a VR headset, and I already have a Quest 2 that I use almost never. Why in the world would I want to get another one? If it’s anything like typical Apple offerings, the first version will be quite meh, and it will really start to come into its own with the second or third iterations.

So why am I actually considering it? A few main reasons. The first is that it would be very useful as a writing device. Not for doing the actual writing, but for visiting anywhere in the world through Google Maps so I can describe what it looks like. I mean, I just went to Kansas this past summer so I could look at it. Seen through that angle, being able to do the same sort of thing, repeatedly, without leaving home, begins to make me think about the price a bit less. True, I could do the same thing (ish) with the Quest, but I think the experience (and the picture) would be significantly better on the Vision Pro. The screens alone are supposed to be incredible, presenting 2 4k screens right in front of your eyes.

They’d also let me do away with two of the main limiting factors I’ve had with VR. First, I don’t like using it with glasses. I always feel like I’m bending my frames, and it’s just not comfortable. (The Vision Pro makes you get specially made corrective lenses that fit into the headset, instead.) Second, I get motion sick using the Quest. Supposedly that has to do with the lag that’s present between when you move your head and when the picture moves in the headset. The Vision Pro has no lag.

But the thing that’s making me consider it even more is something that I hadn’t really thought of much until I was reading reviews. It allows you to take and view 3D pictures and video. (You can also do this on an iPhone 15, though you can’t view them in 3D on the phone.)

Here’s the thing: I view family photos and videos as pretty much priceless. I’m glad that my kids will have so much from their childhood to look back on, and I love being able to look at the old pictures myself. I love having more of them now that I’m snapping shots left and right with my phone. Pictures from earlier are both less crisp and less numerous. What would it be like if I had 3D video from when my kids were babies? How much would that be worth to me now? As I’ve read about this new technology, I think it’s quite likely that these 3D videos become the standard. I only see VR/AR being used more and more in the future. The killer app may not have arrived for it yet, but it will. I’m certain of that. Make it cheap enough and ubiquitous enough, and suddenly everyone will have one, just like everyone has a smartphone these days.

Every day that I don’t have a way to film and take pictures in 3D is one less day I have of those pictures years from now. When my kids are all grown and gone. A decade or two from now, will I be kicking myself that I didn’t just cough up the extra money just so I could have had that many more memories? I think I might.

Now, I also could just buy an iPhone 15 and start taking the pictures and video now, before I can view them. That would be the cheaper way to go, as it would be about a third of the cost. However, that’s also not really something I can justify at all as a writing device. And I actually make real money as an author now. (Not Scrooge McDuck money, but enough to make a tangible difference in my life.) So perhaps some of that could be put to use on this.

Again, I’m on the fence, and I’m waffling back and forth on this. (Plus, I haven’t even talked to Denisa about it yet, and I’d want her green light before I spent that kind of change, writing money or no writing money.) What do you all think about it?