When Apple launched Vision Pro, the reactions split roughly into two camps: those who saw it as the beginning of a new computing paradigm, and those who saw an expensive headset with limited use cases.
Both camps were partially right.
Vision Pro is genuinely impressive as a piece of engineering. The display quality, eye tracking, and hand gesture recognition are leaps beyond what existed before. As a window into what spatial computing can feel like at its best, it is compelling.
But the adoption curve is a different question. At its current price point, Vision Pro is developer hardware with a consumer box. The people actually buying it are mostly those building for it, writing about it, or exploring it as professionals. That is fine — that is how platform ecosystems typically begin.
The more interesting question is what the second and third generation look like. Apple's own roadmap is reportedly targeting a more affordable version. Meta continues to push Vision Pro competitors at significantly lower price points. The hardware cost curve for spatial computing is real and is moving in the same direction it moved for smartphones.
Where I think spatial computing has genuine near-term traction is not in consumer entertainment (where the competition from existing screens is brutal) but in professional and industrial applications. Architecture, surgical planning, complex data visualisation, remote collaboration with spatial context — these are domains where the value proposition is clear enough to justify current price points.
The consumer mass market for spatial computing is probably five to eight years away from meaningful penetration. The professional market is already happening.
What strikes me as underappreciated in most spatial computing discussions is the input model question. Touch was what made smartphones work. What is the spatial computing equivalent? Eye tracking and hand gestures are impressive, but they are not yet as fast or intuitive as touch for most tasks. That input problem matters more than the display quality discussion.
Personal technology observations — not professional advice or official commentary.