Meta Quest may steal another feature from Vision Pro
Meta Quest might get a feature to display iPhone panoramas in VR. This feature is already known from Vision Pro.
Over the weekend, M1 reported on X that the following string of code was found in the iOS version of the Meta Quest app:
"Panoramas that you capture will appear here."
The existence of the string has since been confirmed by X user Luna.
I too have verified this, for anyone wondering: https://t.co/UdUURzhmGB pic.twitter.com/VUSOVEnEEQ
- Luna (@Lunayian) March 10, 2024
The string is ambiguous. It is not clear if, when, and in what form a feature might come out of it.
The fact that the string appears in the Meta Quest app is a possible indication that Quest users may be able to view iPhone panoramas in VR at some point in the future. This is how that looks with Vision Pro:
The Quest update v62 introduced support for Spatial Videos, which is Apple's 3D video format. The videos are uploaded to Meta's server via the Meta Quest app and can then be accessed in Meta Quest. This could work in a similar way with panoramas, as Meta has already laid the technical foundations for this.
Competition between Apple and Meta begins to bear fruit
Meta (formerly Facebook) has always been a master at copying features from other companies. Why wouldn't they do the same with Vision Pro? Spatial video support was announced even before Apple's headset was released. And support for spatial video and panoramas are low-hanging fruit for Meta.
For end users, the competition between Meta and Apple is a great thing because we get new features for free.
The UI and operating system are the biggest strength of the Vision Pro and the biggest weakness of the Meta Quest. Meta is under pressure to catch up in this area. Meta's CTO, Andrew Bosworth, recently said that his team is "reworking some of the core UI infrastructure". So we may see improvements in this area as well.
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