Specs, details, everything we know so far

Another Meta headset is the Quest 3S. Here’s everything we’ve heard about the Quest 3S, including how it likely compares to the Quest 3 and Quest 2.

Over the past 15 months, there has been strong evidence that Meta is preparing to release a cheaper alternative to Quest 3 to replace Quest 2 in its lineup.

S is used here in the same sense as Xbox Series S, meaning a cheaper model, not in the same sense that Apple used for iPhones.

In March 2023, a leaked Meta hardware roadmap mentioned this cheaper headset, and last week Quest’s official store listed “Meta Quest 3S,” a name seen in an apparent leak three months ago that purported to show the headset’s design.

Read on for a full breakdown of all the reliable leaks and rumors about the Quest 3S so far, revealing the trade-offs it makes for a lower price.

Why the need for a cheaper headset?

The Quest 2 launched for $100 less than the original Oculus Quest, so Meta immediately discontinued it. The Quest 3, on the other hand, costs $500, so Meta continued to sell the Quest 2.

Since the launch of Quest 3, Meta has repeatedly dropped the price of Quest 2, first to $250 and then to just $200 in March. In April, he even slashed the official prices of Quest 2 accessories by more than 50% from their original prices.

In February, the higher-storage 256GB Quest 2 model was completely sold out and pulled from all retailers, suggesting that at least that model has ended production.

Task 2 is now only $200

The official price of Quest 2 has been reduced again, now to just $200. And includes a $50 Quest Store credit when you purchase from Walmart.

Recent weeks have also seen the announcement of the first major VR games coming to Quest 3 but not Quest 2, including Survios’ Alien: Rogue Incursion and Meta-owned Camouflaj’s Batman: Arkham Shadow.

The continued price cuts of Quest 2 headsets and accessories, the disappearance of the 256GB model, and the announcement of a first-party flagship game not supporting it strongly suggest that the headset is nearing the end of its time on the market.

But as it stands, if the Quest 2 were off the market, the entry price for the Meta Quest platform would be the $500, 128GB model of the Quest 3. So, in order for the VR market to develop as quickly as possible, Meta needs to ship cheaper headsets. which can run the same content as Quest 3.

Metamap leak confirmed Cheaper headphones are coming this year

In March 2023, about ten months before Quest 3 shipped, an internal meeting with the Meta VR and AR hardware map plan was leaked to The Verge.

In addition to detailing the then-yet-unannounced Quest 3 and Quest Pro 2, the leaked meeting revealed that Meta also plans to deliver a “more affordable” headset in 2024.

Here’s how Meta’s VP of VR Mark Rabkin described the headset in this leaked session:

“The goal of this headset is very simple: pack the biggest punch we can at the most attractive price point in the consumer VR market.”

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman described its appearance and price

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman has a good track record of reliably reporting Meta and Apple hardware and software changes in advance. For example, he reliably reported many details about the Oculus Quest 2 and Apple Vision Pro before they were officially revealed or even acknowledged to exist.

Days before the Quest 3 launch, Gurman announced that Meta’s next headset would be a “mixed reality headset” that “looks a lot like the Quest 3, but uses less expensive components.”

His report claimed that Meta was trying to hit the $300 price point and was at least “considering” shipping the headset without the drivers, selling them separately instead. Note, however, that in recent months Mark Zuckerberg has praised the Touch Plus controllers as a key reason why he thinks the Quest 3 is better than Apple’s Vision Pro.

A Chinese analyst claimed to be using Fresnel lenses with the XR2 Gen 2

A week after Gurman’s report, a Chinese analyst who has accurately reported details of the Meta and Pico headsets in the past released his own claims about the headset.

The analyst first reported that it will use the new Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset from the Quest 3, but paired with the old Fresnel lenses from the Quest 2 to achieve a lower price.

He claimed that the product launch is somewhere between $200 and $300, and could even arrive in the first half of 2024. If he’s right about that last part, expect an announcement later this month.

The Wall Street Journal Confirmd These specifications

In November, The Wall Street Journal reported that Meta plans to bring a cheaper version of Quest 3 to China through a deal with Tencent.

The deal with Tencent was previously reported by Chinese news site 36Kr and The Wall Street Journal itself, although the headset was reported as the Quest 2 in those previous reports.

A November Wall Street Journal report described this cheaper version of the Quest 3 as using cheaper lenses than the Quest 3 but a more powerful GPU than the Quest 2, seemingly agreeing with the Chinese analyst’s claims.

AND Meta Market Research A study on this has seemingly been leaked

Back in March, we saw perhaps the only real images of the Quest 3S in an apparent leak of a Meta market research study.

A three-year-old reddit user with a post history that appears to be that of a real person shared two screenshots that he said were from a Meta presentation shared with them via Zoom as part of a market research study. The title of the presentation is visible as “Quest Design System Research_V2_Final_Phase2_Stim (FR)”. The presentation is in French as indicated by the FR at the end of the title.

One of the images shows that the Quest 3S has the exact same resolution as the Quest 2, suggesting that it will use the same single LCD panel. It also looks noticeably thicker than the Quest 3, supporting claims by a Chinese analyst and The Wall Street Journal that it will use fresnel lenses.

Both images show that the headset has two clusters of three sensors on each side of the front. Presumably two of these sensors are an infrared fisheye camera used for tracking and a color camera for going through mixed reality. But what is the third?

In October, Quest firmware dataminer Samulia discovered a new headset codenamed Panther. Samulia previously revealed many of the Quest Pro’s specs a year ahead of launch, as well as the Quest 3’s resolution and 3D mesh capabilities. A reference to the Panther was in the debug feature for its “simulation” on Quest 3 (which was codenamed Eureka). Using this setting according to the debug log text will prevent the depth projector from being used. This strongly suggests that the Meta is testing to achieve the room setup capabilities that the depth projector currently allows without it.

So the third sensor could simply be an infrared illuminator, allowing the Quest 3S to have a clear view of your environment during room setups regardless of lighting conditions, without costing the same as a depth projector. But that’s just speculation – we just don’t know what it is yet.

Some time after the reddit post was created, the user deleted it. Meta did not comment on the situation.

We did not report this leak at the time because we did not unanimously agree as a team that it was likely to be legitimate. But we’re including it now because the Quest 3S naming seems to be confirmed now.

The Official Quest Store Listed Quest 3S

Last week, the official Quest Store began rolling out support for “Meta Quest 3S” on several app store pages, including the upcoming Alo Moves XR.

This metadata was removed a few hours later, suggesting that Meta accidentally activated it earlier.

This store listing appears to directly confirm the naming of Meta’s next headset as the Quest 3S, potentially confirming a leak of a market research study from March.

Summary (TL; DR)

Putting all the evidence together, it’s likely that production of the Quest 2 has ended and Meta is currently clearing inventory to prepare for the launch of a similarly priced direct replacement called the Quest 3S.

The Quest 3S will seemingly feature the same Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset as the Quest 3, so it can run the same content with the same graphical fidelity, but using the old Fresnel lenses from the Quest 2 will put you somewhere around $300.

	Task 2	Task 3S	Task 3
Chipset	Snapdragon XR2 (7nm)	Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 (4nm)	Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 (4nm)
Lenses	Fresnel	Fresnel	Pancake
Drive through	Very low resolution Black white	Decent resolution? Color	Decent Res Color
Admission price	Start: $300 Current: $200	~$300?	500 dollars

It will also almost certainly support mixed color reality, but potentially with a slower and less accurate room setup process.

In fact, the Quest 3S will be a cheaper Quest 3 with a bulkier design, worse lens clarity and lower resolution. A cheaper and lower quality – but not fundamentally different – device. It will allow more people to enjoy Quest 3 VR graphics and also greatly expand the room-aware mixed reality market.