Oculus

Almost a fifth of Facebook employees are now working on VR and AR: report

Facebook has nearly 10,000 employees in its division working on augmented reality and virtual reality devices, according to a report in The Information based on internal organizational data. The number means the Reality Labs division accounts for almost a fifth of the people working at Facebook worldwide. This suggests that Facebook has been significantly accelerating… Read more

HTC announces Vive Pro lip tracking module and new VR body trackers

HTC has announced a new set of trackers for its Vive virtual reality headsets, including one that captures facial expressions and mouth movements. The $129.99 Vive Facial Tracker attaches to the Vive Pro headset. It uses two cameras and an infrared illuminator to record lip, cheek, and jaw movements and then translates that into virtual… Read more

HTC may be teasing the release of a VR lip tracker for Vive headsets

HTC may be teasing new modules and attachments for its Vive virtual reality headsets, including a lip tracker, UploadVR reports. HTC’s been building up to some kind of announcement on its Vive Twitter account over the last week. Yesterday, it posted an image of a hinge, which savvy Twitter users matched to an experimental lip… Read more

Mark Zuckerberg says realistic avatars are Facebook’s next big VR bet

Facebook’s future virtual reality headsets should capture users’ facial expressions for more realistic digital avatars, says CEO Mark Zuckerberg. In a podcast interview for The Information, Zuckerberg expounded on the next decade in virtual and augmented reality, including future Oculus VR devices. “One of the things that I’m really excited about for future versions is… Read more

Sony announces six PlayStation VR games, including Doom 3 for VR

Sony has announced a new slate of PlayStation VR games for later this year. It includes a virtual reality adaptation of Doom 3, as well as titles from a few successful VR studios and a couple of relative newcomers to VR. Sony announced a new generation of PSVR for its PlayStation 5 console last month…. Read more

Facebook now wants to make ‘Hey Facebook’ a thing

Facebook has introduced a new “Hey Facebook” wake word for its family of Portal smart displays and the Oculus Quest platform. The company only formally announced it was gradually rolling out to Quest headsets, but its Portal support page now lists “Hey Facebook” as an alternative to “Hey Portal.” A look through the Wayback Machine… Read more

Oculus reapproved Virtual Desktop’s native PC streaming feature for Quest headsets

The Virtual Desktop app for the Oculus Quest has been updated to enable the wireless streaming of PC VR games natively over Wi-Fi, eliminating the need to go through the complex multistep sideloading process I outlined here. Oddly enough, this isn’t the first time the app has sported this feature. Its developer introduced it in… Read more

Customizable Framework Laptop Lets You Pick Ports, Reduces E-Waste

Home News (Image credit: Framework) Most people by a laptop, never upgrade it, and toss it when it’s time for a new model. Framework, a San Francisco-based startup, hopes to upend that paradigm with its Framework Laptop, a 13.5-inch notebook that appears to be an easily upgradeable, customizable portable unlike any other. It could also… Read more

The Framework Laptop is an upgradable, customizable 13-inch notebook coming this spring

A San Francisco-based startup called Framework has just launched an ambitious project: a thin, lightweight productivity laptop that it claims can be “upgraded, customized, and repaired in ways that no other notebook can.” Framework founder Nirav Patel told The Verge that the company aims to address his long-standing frustrations with consumer technology companies. Patel was… Read more

Upcoming Oculus Quest and Quest 2 games: VR experiences to watch out for

(Pocket-lint) – Looking for an excuse to buy an Oculus Quest 2? Or just wondering what games will be available to play? Then you’ve come to the right place. squirrel_widget_2679961 There are numerous VR experiences coming in the next few months. Fantastic games to add to the collection of already awesome games available on the… Read more

New Oculus Quest feature lets you mark your actual couch in VR

A new Oculus Quest feature expands the headset’s Guardian mode by letting you mark your real couch as an object that’ll show up in VR. The Guardian is an Oculus safety feature that lets you draw lines around your environment that act as a virtual boundary and appear in VR when you get too close… Read more

Qualcomm’s new AR ‘Smart Viewer’ lets you pin virtual screens to your walls

Chip maker Qualcomm has introduced a new reference design for augmented reality glasses: an AR “smart viewer” you can tether to a phone or PC via USB-C. Called the XR1 Smart Viewer, the system is meant to be lightweight and look (sort of) like sunglasses, while also enabling features like hand tracking and spatial awareness…. Read more

Facebook’s Oculus begins rolling out multiuser support, starting with the Quest 2

Facebook is now rolling out multiuser support as an experimental feature for Oculus Quest 2 headsets, the company announced on Thursday. The primary account holder will be able to add up to three additional accounts to one device. Facebook is also rolling out app sharing as an experimental feature for the Quest 2, which will… Read more

Facebook is secretly building a smartwatch and planning to sell it next year

Facebook is building a smartwatch as part of its ongoing hardware efforts, according to a new report from The Information. The device is said to be an Android-based smartwatch, though the report does not say Facebook intends for the device to run Google’s Wear OS. It also says Facebook is working on building its own… Read more

What’s on your desk, Sam Byford?

If you buy something from a Verge link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement. While many of us moved to home offices when companies sought to avoid COVID-19 infection, for some people, working at home is the norm. One of those people is Sam Byford, Asia editor for The Verge, who… Read more