The (main) reason I'm Very Excited about Apple Vision Pro

It's not what you'd ever guess

You may be surprised to hear I was not a huge believer when the iPhone came out. I had a Nokia E90 that actually was a far superior phone to the original iPhone. The iPhone of course became better over time and is now far beyond what the E90 was and is now a fantastic blend of hardware and software, but it’s easy to forget it started pretty basic. The original demo on stage actually involved something like a dozen actual phones since it wasn’t even capable of doing the very basic tasks at the time.

That’s how I view the Vision Pro. This is a 0.001 device. Apple’s very first toe in the water of VR/AR. It’s not meant for everyone. They don’t even plan on making beyond a few hundred thousand. It shouldn’t be thought of much more than a developer beta device.

Yet looking at it, it’s wildly capable and light years ahead of what any other company is producing. People who have used it say it does in fact deliver on what Apple promised, even almost a year before it launches to the public.

Now, what I find most interesting is the Vision Pro will of course be launching with an App Store. Here’s where it gets interesting. How do you define what you can do with an iPhone? The answer is different to each individual. That’s because there are so many apps that how every person uses it is completely different. So too will be the Vision Pro. This is why Apple doesn’t define it more than a “spatial computing” device. No two people will find the same uses in it, say perhaps content consumption, communications, etc., again similar to an iPhone.

From the day of launch, there will literally be thousands of ways to use Vision Pro.

There’s what we know, what we don’t know, and what we don’t know we don’t know and trust me, the latter is by far the largest group regarding the Vision Pro. We mostly cannot even grasp how this device will be used. The most impressive demos showcased in Apple’s presentation were only seconds long and honestly, some of them were convincing enough to buy the device for that single use case. The fact there will be thousands of them in a single device is mind blowing to me.

But one above all else makes me crazy excited and it’s only because I’ve been using it for years. Now, this may not get you excited, but it should show you an example of what you don’t even know exists.

I bought an Oculus Quest 2 during Covid. It was a lot of fun. Beatsaber, Onward, and other games were great ways to pass the time during lockdown.

But then I found another app…..Tripp. It’s a VR Meditation app. With the limited computing power of the Quest, its graphics weren’t too impressive, but that wasn’t the point. You’d put on the headset, pick what kind of guided meditation session you wanted, and for 20-60 minutes, Tripp would take you on a journey through mesmerizing procedurally generated worlds with a soothing voice and breathing exercises to either help calm your nerves, help you concentrate, or prepare you for sleep.

I got hooked. I did it multiple times a day. And honestly, no single thing has helped my mental health more. I finally picked up a Quest 3 recently and going back (my Quest 2 broke about a year ago) has been fantastic. My overall mood has been better and I feel calmer and calmer every day. It’s like a quiet sanctuary that you can disappear into at any time of day just by slipping on a headset. The world around you simply disappears.

And quite honestly, I bought my Quest 3 for no other reason and don’t regret it at all. Just for VR meditation, it’s worth the price.

As for the Vision Pro, the idea of using all that horsepower combined it it’s AR capabilities for mindfulness literally gives me heart palpitations. And undoubtedly the big players like Tripp and Calm, which I use all the time, have big plans. For that single reason alone, I will be buying one the moment it’s available for order. I’m sure I’ll use it for lots of other reasons, but that is why I’ll be buying one since I already know how much benefit I derive from a substantially less impressive and powerful device.

So, if you haven’t ever tried VR Meditation and you’re curious, try Tripp on the Quest 3. And if you needed another reason to look forward to the Vision Pro or to realize how much of a game changing device this will be, understand there will be wildly more use cases for it that you' haven’t even thought of yet than you’ve even considered.

I cannot wait. And I cannot wait to see where spatial computing is in 10 years.