Apple expands Vision Pro to more countries outside the U.S.

Apple’s mixed reality headset, the Vision Pro, will become available in more countries outside of the U.S. on Friday.

Customers in Australia are already able to purchase the headset as of Friday morning. The Vision Pro will also hit the shelves in Canada, France, Germany and the U.K. when stores open.

This comes after the headset’s debut in Asian markets – China, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore – on June 28.

At one of Apple’s largest stores in London on Regent Street, customers booked slots for demos with the Vision Pro. While Apple has long allowed potential customers to test other gadgets in store, the Vision Pro is a new product with a hefty price tag.

When the store opened at 8 a.m. local time, Apple employees applauded those entering the store as they came to test the headset.

Liam Nicholson was the first to enter the Apple Store on Regent Street, one of London’s most popular shopping areas. He had pre-booked an appointment to pick up his Vision Pro.

“I think the spatial aspect of it and just feeling immersed was really good. But also still being in touch with the outside world,” Nicholson told CNBC, describing why he likes the device.

“So I tried it on at a conference and just felt like I was still in the room. And then someone pulled up a dinosaur demo, the dinosaur comes out to bite your hand and it felt like it was really there. So the clarity of it compared to what I’ve seen with other aspects is amazing.”

For established hardware like iPhones, typically people can just pre-order online without the fanfare or hands-on testing. But the Vision Pro demos offer Apple a chance to convince people why they should drop $3,499 for its headset — far pricier than other mass-market headsets. In the U.K. the Vision Pro costs £3,499.

Nicholson said he thinks the high price tag is worth it for the way it fits into the broader Apple suite of products.

“I think as all the apps come on board and things like that, that’s the thing that’s probably really worth it. Like I’ve got an iPhone, got a [Apple] Watch, having it all fit is definitely worth it,” he said.

Bryan Ma, vice president of International Data Corporation, said there’s no doubt that there’s huge excitement for the Vision Pro as it is “a relatively new product category that is far from mainstream.” Besides, it is also a product “coming from Apple, whose implementation is far ahead of the competition.”

However, the challenge is whether Apple can sustain the initial weeks of excitement and convert that into sustainable sales, Ma said.

“That will be difficult given not only the currently sky-high price tag, but also the fact that the ecosystem of applications and use cases is still evolving,” Ma said in emailed comments.

In the first quarter, Meta maintained its top position in the mixed/virtual reality headset market, while Apple’s recent entry propelled it to No. 2, according to an IDC report published on June 18. ByteDance, Xreal, and HTC were also in the top five.

“Both Meta’s Quest 3 and the Vision Pro helped educate users and enticed developers to create mixed reality content, blending the digital and physical worlds,” said IDC.

“Unfortunately, this has come at a premium for users,” IDC added, referring to the high price points.

Apple reportedly trimmed its Vision Pro sales expectations to around 400,000 to 450,000 units in 2024, down from 700,000 to 800,000 earlier, according to Ming-Chi Kuo, an Apple analyst at TF International Securities. Kuo attributed the lower shipment forecast to declining demand.

“We’re expecting Apple to ship about 400,000 units this year, almost half of which will be outside of the U.S. That compares to a total market of 7.3 million units. This can ramp up more quickly if we start to see hardware prices come down and utility from the applications increase,” said Ma.

– CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal contributed to this report.