TidBITS Poll: How Much Would You Pay for a Vision Pro?
This isn’t exactly one of our Do You Use It? polls, but it’s similarly aimed at helping us all understand the collective opinion of the TidBITS audience. Much has been said about the cost of Apple’s new Vision Pro, with the base unit priced at $3499. But it’s easy to spend more—well over $4000 after tax—if you want more storage, need prescription lenses, add AppleCare+, think you’d use a travel case, and so on.
So yes, the Vision Pro is expensive, but that’s not to say it’s overpriced, given its undoubtedly high component and assembly costs. Reports suggest that Apple may have sold as many as 200,000 units on the opening weekend, so some people think the Vision Pro is worth what Apple is charging.
How about you? Given what you know about the Vision Pro and the real-world uses you might have for it, how much would you pay for it? Don’t answer from simple techno-lust—think hard about how much value you would derive from the Vision Pro, perhaps in the context of other Apple devices.
It’s a tough one when you aware of the extraordinary tech but the use case is not what you would want. I’m very curious to check it out, but I’ve no yen for VR.
Spot on. My use case is probably different from most people’s because I could justify it purely by writing about it, at least in that $500 to $1000 range. And having a big Mac screen while on an airplane and when on trips (though I travel much less than before the pandemic) would be worthwhile. (But can you wear an N95 mask while using the Vision Pro? I wouldn’t set foot on an airplane without a mask today.) But I can’t see getting anywhere near as much value out of it as my iPhone 15 Pro or MacBook Air, much less my 27-inch iMac with a second 27-inch display.
My feeling about it, and price range, align with Adam’s. And no, I wouldn’t get on a plane without a mask. I won’t even enter the supermarket without a mask. But then again, people here in Tokyo are still mostly wearing masks.
I am in the process of revising my Take Control book on Apple Interface Mysteries, and, as the Vision Pro and visionOS introduce a whole new set of user interface conventions, conventions that will reverberate among the existing Apple interfaces, I need to explore the day to day experience of using the visionOS UX.
I don’t see why I would buy one myself because I’m fine using a regular monitor for my work. My type of work (coding, writing, presentations) does not benefit from all the extra potential of these goggles, but it sure would be a lot more fidgety than just turning on the 27" in front of me and getting to work. Not to mention 2.5 hrs lifetime (unless tethered), discomfort, etc.
That said, I still selected $500-$1000 because I think it’s absolutely fair to consider this a monitor worth that price. If we for a moment recall that Apple presently charges about $2k for a reasonably spec’ed 5K screen, a sub-$1k price point for this is certainly no stretch by any means.
I have no problem conceding that this is expensive hardware intended for early adopters. But for myself there is by far not enough bang for buck here. For all those who are intrigued by these goggles but cannot afford them, I have this simple truth to offer for consolation. Rest assured this gen 1 AVP is the worst Apple Vision they will ever release. The next one will perhaps be less expensive, but for sure it will be a whole lot better.
I selected “I wouldn’t buy one” because I can’t see any use for me at this time. On the other hand, I do think the price they are charging for v1 is probably about right.
I didn’t see any use in a smart phone until the iPhone 5s. It might be the same with the VP.
I’d be happy to be proved wrong but I think it’s a dead end product. Too bulky, unwieldy and power hungry. Yes, all those problems would be solved if they can shrink it down into the size of a pair of spectacles without a separate battery pack but is that really within the realm of the possible (at least in my lifetime) ?
The question on price is unanswerable until I know whether it would make me sick. This is not a casual question. I have extreme motion sickness – on a bad day, I can get sick watching a train go by. I strongly doubt I can use any headset, but without more information, how can I know?
That’s from me as a person with autism. Given how widespread sensory problems are in autism, I think we need a separate review by a profile of people with sensory differences.
It is frightening to imagine the possibility that a device like this might become mandatory for work or daily life.
According to Wikipedia, the Apple //e was released in January 1983, and cost US$1,995 ($5,860 in 2022) which included the main unit with: Disk II and controller, Apple Monitor III and stand, and Extended 80-Column Text Card. I mention this because it is relevant to my reply. I was willing to pay that much for my very first computer because I was excited about the prospect of owning it. At that time I really didn’t have a clear idea of how I would use this cool thing, but I wanted it.
Now, 40 years later, another really cool thing is coming out; so why am I not just excited about getting it? Two reasons.
One, I’m twice as old as I was then, so I’m less impressed by the cool stuff just because it’s cool. It has to have some obvious value to satisfy a need.
Two, I already have a lot of cool stuff like the MBPro I’m typing this on, the iPhone that serves so many purposes, the iPad that serves some purposes (occasionally), and even my new Kindle when I want to read a good novel in bed; so when would I find time to invest in another gadget, just because it’s cool? Remember, I’m old.
Even at age 80, I’d likely spring for a Vision Pro IF I really needed something it provides. But who knows? Maybe by the time I’m 90 I’ll have the latest version; but today? Nah!
I think the Vision Pro is like a Mac with an infinite display. I can’t afford the price, but feel I’d pay over $1000 just for the display features.
There’s definite interest in high-quality VR / AR headsets. I teach chemistry, and there’s been some adoption among universities for both the educational aspects and the research aspects of VR. (It’s hard to teach about 3D molecules with 2D displays and static physical models only get you so far.)
I selected $500-1000, although I expect that a “Vision Air” or “Vision Light” in the $1500-1800 range could still get some significant adoption for science and engineering – even if it required a power cord rather than the existing battery pack.
The catch with a lot of VR headsets is that you also need a pretty good PC with a good GPU. So a self-contained system like Vision Pro is nice … and a mid-level or low-level version would undercut the cost of the PC + headset competition.
Looking forward to Gen2 or Gen 3 and a “Vision” (non-Pro) edition.
I actually find today’s iPads too expensive for the use I get out of them. My current iPad mini 5 is the last one standing of 5 I’ve owned. I’d love to replace it with at least a mini 6 or maybe an Air, but I just cannot justify the price of either, given the mini 5 is still running fine and its use cases, although daily, are rather limited for me.
That’s how I see the Vision Pro. An iPad for my face. Way cooler, but not way different in use cases. I still have an iPhone 11 Pro and I guess I will upgrade soon to remain “current” but as someone who couldn’t care less about the cameras… what am I missing out on?
No, for me, the device I will spend thousands on is my Mac. If I had $4000 burning a hole in my pocket today, and the Vision Pro was actually available in New Zealand, I’d buy a MacBook Pro.
I can imagine no use for it.
I can also imagine eventually being convinced that I have a use for it. Even then, though, that price would have to be a whole lot lower for me to consider it. My uneducated guess would be some price under $1,500.
I would like to try to try Apple Vision because I’m interested in optics and vision. But I wouldn’t buy one because my vision is not up to it. I was extremely myopic until I had cataract surgery several years ago. The surgery corrected my vision so I can see clearly beyond about three feet, and walk around or drive without wearing glasses. However, I cannot see sharply closer without reading glasses. I am working happily now on a 27-inch desktop screen, but I find small screens uncomfortable and don’t use a smartphone. I can see that Apple Vision Pro is not matched to my needs.
I have one sitting in my office waiting for the prescription lens inserts to arrive. I can’t see that it’s rationally worth the price, but I’m not going to suffer hardship from buying it. If we take the price I paid for older Macs in the 1990s and early 2000s and apply the inflation percentage to them, their price was comparable to the AVP.
I’m curious about it, and getting the demo from Apple convinced me that it wouldn’t be a total waste.
I voted “I wouldn’t buy one” with the following reasons:
That being the case, I guess I will buy the Vision Pro when these conditions are met:
I do think it’s worth $3,500. It is a tour de force of engineering and design. It is not for consumers (except for rabid movie persons who don’t like going to movie theaters and sitting with, er, other persons).
I won’t get one, even though I’d love to try it, because I basically have just one eye (the other has the equivalent of peripheral vision) . . . so monocular depth perception. So, not so attractive.
But, in an office, for a purpose like architectural design, product design, molecule design, 3D visualization or endless training purposes this is the bees knees. No other AR/VR system that I’m aware-of has this level of image quality & ease of control for this price. And once the developers get their teeth into it? Yow.
It’s not going to be an iPhone-class consumer innovation but it sure is going to shake things up a bit in a few years. But as I’ve said elsewhere on TidBits, what we all really want is a holodeck; no helmet.
Dave
As an Apple consultant, I’m certainly curious, but generally shy away from V1. Yes I did buy the very first Mac, with a blazing 128K of RAM, and don’t regret because it got me using a computer in a practical and playful way. That said, I waited for the v2 of the iPhone and iPad. I can’t say that I’ll get v2 of the Vision Pro, because as of now it seems to be a wonderful toy and not something that will make me more productive. Like many, most of my entertainment watching is with my husband, no solo. We’ll see, but not now.
If we are considering value, then there is work to be considered. Beyond the specifics VR brings to certain work, Apple are pushing productivity. It’s aligned with the AR emphasis they bring. Your virtual desk in your actual room.
It strikes me that it’s probably productive in the way that an iPad Pro is productive. That is to say, you can be productive, even very productive, but not as much as on your Mac.
The implementation of the Mac on the platform I had thought might expand but, thinking about it, I’m not so sure. There’s only so far the two interfaces work together.
Watching Patel and the others shifting and moving arms and tilting heads as they navigate their way, I wondered about this in groups or large numbers. What a strange species we might become.
We are a ways off true AR and optical rather than video pass through, but it is interesting to consider how the human animal is still key to what is possible. What will we think of each other when we can see each others faces, but not what we are each looking at, as we tilt and pinch and wave?
I wouldn’t buy the current iteration – it doesn’t have a real use case. A smaller version that sit like glasses on my face and run for days? Then I’d fire some real money up. Driving with a built in head’s up display giving me directions (I’m assuming that the future version will be genuinely see-through)? Awesome. The ability to check on things without diving into my pocket to get my phone out? Superb.
But yes, this one has a way to go.
This should be a poll option. How can I answer this when I haven’t tried it out and when the use case hasn’t even been well articulated?
I put 500 because I could see wanting one for a similar reason that I wanted an Apple watch; it extends the iphone apps and makes my life easier, more fun or similar. The Vision Pro probably is worth what they are charging in absolute terms, but I believe the object here is to find out the price point each individual is willing to meet.
The initial cost is way too high. I think of this as the latest Lisa-like device. Way over priced. The next similar device will be more affordable.
After looking at the teardown at iFixit, I have concluded that Apple’s price is reasonable for an incredibly complicated and well made device. I think they could reduce the price by getting rid of the ridiculous eyesight feature without harming its usefulness one iota.
The question is what I would be willing to pay. As a Mac-centric person, it would be just a single Mac screen with fewer pixels than the Studio Display which costs half the price of the headset. Another drawback is lack of support for bluetooth mice. I think $1k is about right for such a device for me.
The “entertainment” aspect of the device is less important to me - I am somewhat disturbed by the isolation which results from using it. That is close to a show-stopper, despite the coolness of the immersive 3D experience.
I would welcome a well-executed flight simulator. Due in part to health issues, I sold my airplane last year and would enjoy experiencing being a pilot again if the simulator were well done. This might increase what I would be willing to pay for it.
I would pay top dollar for a device that helps my failing vision, especially in settings like live entertainment. Someone out there is already trying to get there first, if I know my creator class. My first thought was this is just the beginning for augmented vision. I just hope and pray optical science is going in this direction. People have electronic devices to help them hear, and I think this shows us the way for electronically enhanced vision. Putting on live-augmented reality shows would be amazing in small groups. This might limit the commercial appeal of this use for huge corporations, but be a real boon for small arts groups everywhere. The kludge here is the lens inserts. This will be what we will be shaking our heads over ten years from now. After they figure that out we will really be buying these things.
Exactly.
I want an Apple Vision Air. I want one very much. It would be the thin edge of the wedge to get a lot of folks on board.
I am reminded of when I purchased my own first Mac, (a Power Macintosh 7500) which, including the monitor and keyboard, set me back well over $4000. in 1995 dollars. That’s nearly $8K in today’s money. Nearly 30 years later the ticket price for Apple’s highest-end is remarkably stable (altho obviously a much better value in terms of spending power and technology). This rationalization helps me get on board with a Vision Pro.
For a question like this, I like to cite one of my managers at work. He told me “If there’s a need for something, I’ll authorize millions of dollars to buy it. If there’s no need, I won’t authorize ten cents.”
I concur. I would spend $5000 for an AVP if I thought I had a need for it. But since I can’t think of one, I wouldn’t spend any amount of money on it.
This is the same reason why I don’t have
Well, let’s not panic prematurely. While I agree that certain kinds of tech are hard to avoid (e.g. personal banking without a computer is possible, but actively discouraged by many banks), but they’re hardly mandatory.
While we can assume that some kinds of jobs may require use of VR/AR, I think it will be quite a long time before that becomes so mainstream that they can’t be avoided. And given the fact that a lot of people have problems with the tech today, I think it’s safe to assume that it will have improve quite a lot before we get close to that point.
I may eat my words at some point. But…
My initial thought, not having tried it, is that it’s going to be super cool but that I’m not going to like feeling like I’m not in the real world.
I used to perform on stage with a band with super high-tech gear, including in-ear monitors and personal monitor mixers. They have a purpose: protecting your ears, helping you get a balanced mix that you can never hear from the big stage… But I felt like I was in a cave. That I was isolated from the other players standing around me. Nevermind that all the audio sounded fake because it wasn’t acoustic; it was run to the board digitized, and then fed back down to me and unpacked.
I didn’t feel like I was making music with my friends, that I was having an organic experience. Could I have gotten used to it with some more time and effort? Maybe. But I’m not sure.
And then there’s just the idea of putting down my tech. A big point of VP is to have the tech move with you. It’s a mobile solution. But often I want the opposite: I want to PUT DOWN my tech. I want to unplug, and go play my piano. Or sit outside and watch the birds, Or – wait for it – talk to my family. Heck, I even take off my glasses and see things blurry just to get away from them and the world they bring to me. VP presents the option of augmented reality so that you can see the real world plus their overlay. Nice in theory. But I think when I’m done doing what needs to be done, I’m going to want to rip it off.
Time will tell. Let me know when you guys have worked out all the bugs and chopped the price way down :-)
The irony is this tech is probably the best way to “get away from it all” ever invented.
I can picture a parent being driven crazy by noisy demanding kids, a phone that won’t stop ringing and beeping, living in a crowded city where it’s hard to find a moment of peace and quiet, putting on this with noise-canceling AirPods, bringing up an immersive environment, and suddenly being transported thousands of miles away to Hawaii or a desert or wherever they consider ideal. The hectic real world is gone and for a few minutes, they are in heaven. It really could be healing.
Whilst it’s expensive I’d pay the money if I thought it worthwhile. The issue is I’m not seeing how I would use it. At $500-1000 (as I voted) it’s more of an affordable curiosity. I believe it will find lots of uses in various fields, just not many for me personally.
Mind you, it could be a slow burner like Apple watch. I didn’t get one until Series 6 and now I struggle to get along without it.
Yeesh. Way too heavy, bad battery life, and who’s using this?
/people reviewing cellphones in the late 1980s.
I guess it depends on whether you enjoy the real world or the fake world more
I have no quarrel with the price. I can see $3500 worth of parts, engineering, and development in there.
I currently have no particular use for it, but I can imagine such a use materializing. Probably by that time there will be something available for ½–⅔ the price.
Just for some perspective. The cost of a base AVP today is the equivalent of $1200 when Mac came out back in '84 (Mac launched at $2495) or $2400 when iPhone launched in 2007.
I’m torn between not buying one (because I’m not sure I’ll have use for it and I’m not sure how well it works if I’m wearing prescription multifocal lens glasses) and spending an amount that won’t exceed the cost of a good 5-6k display. And there’s the catch… Considering Apple displays there’s the studio at $1,600 and the Pro XDR at $5,000…
Anyway - $3,500 is too steep for me at this stage. Maybe the next release.
I’m intrigued by those historical numbers, mostly because of how I think about the raw prices. $2500 for a decent Mac setup has seemed reasonable for decades, for instance, and I have trouble with prices above $3000. My 2020 27-inch iMac was $2600, though my 2014 27-inch iMac was $3200 (and I bought the 27-inch Thunderbolt Display at the same time for $900). I winced slightly at the $3200 price, as I remember, but the 5K Retina display was a game-changer. Even my previous Mac Pro was only $2300. For the MacBook Air models I’ve owned, it looks like I usually end up spending between $1600 and $2000.
Simultaneously, the iPhone Pro prices are a little hard to take with a starting point of $1000, but that has been stable (with the same amount of storage) since the iPhone 12 Pro and with less storage since the iPhone X. And since I need the 256 GB of storage, I’m usually paying $1100 before AppleCare and tax.
But in each of these cases, I know that I need what I’m getting. With the iPhones, I may be upgrading unnecessarily so I can write about the new stuff, but there’s no question that a device I’m using for 3+ hours each day is worth $1100 per year to me. And it’s even easier to justify spending money on Macs that I’ll use 8+ hours per day.
But with a $3500 starting point and probably $4200 final cost for a device that at its most useful would be as a Mac display, I just can’t pull the trigger, even if I would have bought a Mac for an equivalent amount in the past.
The first Mac I bought new (vs. acquiring from corporations tossing old gear or flea markets) was my Quicksilver-2002 PowerMac G4. I paid about $3000 for that system (almost the top-of-the-line configuration) and I was very happy with it.
But over the years, the high end models (PowerMac G5, then Mac Pro) got so much more expensive and the entry-level models (MacBook Air and Mac mini) got so much more powerful, that the logic of buying the biggest model made stopped making sense for a personal home computer.
Today, I still spend more than the minimum (currently looking at about $1800 for a Mac configured as I like it), and I would be willing to spend $3000 today if I could think of a use for the extra horsepower, but for what I do, I just can’t justify the higher cost.
I paid about $3000 for a 512K Mac, printer, and a 1200K modem in 1985, and it seemed fair but expensive at the time. The only time after that I bought a high-end Mac was in 2004 when I paid about $3000 for G5 Power Mac and a 17-inch Studio Display. The Studio Display failed after 3-4 years and since then I have been buying MacMinis and generic displays, most recently a 4K 27-inch Dell last year. That’s all that many of us need.
The potential of Apple’s Vision Pro for a fighter pilot is remarkable, offering advanced features that could significantly enhance their situational awareness and decision-making in the cockpit. However, my skepticism arises from concerns about the unintended consequences of technology that further separates individuals from one another, potentially impacting the essential human connections that contribute to effective communication and collaboration.
In other words, I hate the bloody thing.
The US military has had in-helmet display systems for quite some time. Here’s one example: Collins Aerospace: F-35 Gen III Helmet Mounted Display System (HMDS).
The price seems very reasonable to me given the R&D costs that Apple has invested over the last 5 or more years. Just watch the short “behind the scenes” video of the manufacturing and think how much the production line machinery and robotics alone must have cost. Apple has taken the long view here by putting out a new device that only it has the financial resources and technical knowhow to produce. It is betting that developers will generate user applications well beyond what is currently imagined - most probably in the professional workspace - medicine, aerospace, nuclear power - and we all know that professional equipment is 10x as expensive as anything used by the general public.
So whether we think this is expensive or not is beside the point. It’s not designed for us, and we should be thankful that it doesn’t cost $10,000.
So much of actual reality to enjoy to bother with virtual reality. I could see this for hard core gamers, but this device makes me think of the movie Wall-E.
I really haven’t looked into it too much.
I’m wondering about its possibilities & implications for educational, scientific, and medical purposes/uses and the benefits.
I’d probably get one if I had that kind of money burning a hole in my pocket, just to explore it uses.
Do you remember how expensive the original Mac was ($2,500?) and how little it did? It came with two apps, MacWrite and MacPaint, and when it was released there were no third party apps available, if I remember correctly, although Microsoft released a spreadsheet program before too long.
But it was useful to virtually everybody.
The AVP right now is AFAICT useful to gamers and movie watchers, basically recreational. I don’t see a single productivity application right now that is broadly useful. I will emphasize right now. I have no doubt AVP could become very useful in the near future in certain professional areas. I’m sure a company like GE or RR would love to use something like this for the training of their junior technicians on how to properly disassemble a $15M turbofan engine and then put it back together again, similar in medicine/surgery. I’m sure there will eventually be lots of specialized professional applications where there is a very simple and clear value proposition. But I doubt this will ever have the broad versatility of an iPhone or Mac, and that’s before we even consider the value proposition. In that sense I can see why someone like Gurman would claim it’s the iPad that the AVP will displace, not the Mac or iPhone.
I frequently hear comparisons made between the initial launch of the AVP and the iPhone or the AVP and the first Mac. I think there are at least two differences.
In the case of the iPhone, it filled a niche, a gaping hole in the cellphone market. As Jobs famously said, most people hated their phones: they were difficult to use, did very few things well, etc. The iPhone was a revelation: a device which did three things infinitely better than the existing devices: a better phone, an iPod and an internet communication device. All in one device. This niche simply doesn’t exist for VR devices: nobody is yearning for a better way to view an iPad or a Mac. The screens and UI of these devices work just fine as is, thank you.
The other difference is the use of the headset for productivity. A number of reviewers claim that when using the Mac screen provided by the device, you can be as productive as you would be using a Mac in the usual way. Note that I said “as productive” and not more productive. The original Mac was a breakthrough in making computers easier to use and eventually with more programs would make the user much more productive than using the former command line UI.
Why should someone attach an expensive heavy device with a short battery life to their face to just be as productive as they already are? The expense of the device would be added to that of their existing Mac. Furthermore, the screen provided by the AVP for the virtual Mac is not as sharp as the retina screens on all existing Macs as well as the Studio Display.
In a way, Apple is attempting to create a new market sector defined by a new paradigm for using a computer or iPad. Whether this works in the long run is questionable. But, the comparison to the first Mac or iPhone doesn’t work in my opinion.
I have vision in only one eye, so it’s useless unless someone comes up with a compensating solution to create the illusion of dual dimension.
The AVP may work for you. See
That support article is amazing—they have thought through so many things with this!
I have one strong eye (the other amounts to peripheral vision only) and by gosh you can tell AVP which eye to follow!
That still doesn’t solve my monocular depth perception issue which I doubt will ever be solved so I guess I’ll just have to put up with my flat screens fixed in one place.
Dave
Strange that you didn’t include an option for people who might be willing to pay more than $3500.
Whilst I’ve no particular desire to buy or use one of these things, from what I’ve seen and read the device is really quite something, bringing together some brilliant software and hardware designs utilising some amazing technologies. I was chatting to my 90 year old father about the Vision Pro and suggested to him that it was quite expensive (of course the same could be said of all Apple kit). He responded by pointing out that a high quality hearing aid would cost about the same - which to my mind brings a fresh and useful perspective. Comparing the Vision Pro to something like an iPad is the wrong question to ask - it’s comparing apples with pears.
Well, I figured that anyone who would pay more than $3500 would have ordered one already.
The comparison with a high-quality hearing aid is an interesting one, at least for those for whom the Vision Pro would be allowing them to interact with the real world in ways they couldn’t otherwise due to a disability.
I wouldn’t buy one. People are already so disconnected from one another; I fear this will contribute to that trend. Eg running into people tripping down the street staring at their phones, or the people who “multitask” live conversations with phone usage, and the phone usually wins. I don’t say there are no socially valuable use cases - maybe training of surgeons or mechanics, that sort of thing. I am no luddite, but a developer who spends 8 hours or more a day in front of a 27” 4K monitor, plus iPhone use, plus iPad use. I am also a composer. Maybe I would be tempted if someone came up with an app enhancement that would ease the process of note entry. In sum: it needs a killer app, not to mention a drastic price reduction, before it goes mainstream.