Today, Samsung hosted a special event to launch Galaxy XR, its first standalone Mixed Reality headset, built with Google and Samsung. I have watched the live stream (and tweeted a lot about it), and these have been the main key points for me.
Galaxy XR launched for $1799
We have been waiting for months to know the name, price, and release date of the “Project Moohan” headset. Today, Samsung has announced that the headset is called Galaxy XR, and is available to be purchased in the US and Korea starting from $1799. People buying the headset can also enjoy an Explorer pack with some free perks like 12 months of Gemini AI Pro and 12 months of YouTube Premium.
These are some of its main specifications, taken from Samsung’s website:
| Galaxy XR | |
|---|---|
| Memory | 16GB Memory 256GB Storage |
| Display | 3,552 x 3,840, 29 million pixels Micro-OLED 6.3‑micron pixel pitch 96% DCI‑P3 Refresh rates: 60Hz, 72Hz (Default), 90Hz Field of View 109 degrees horizontal and 100 degrees vertical |
| Chip | Snapdragon® XR2+ Gen 2 Platform |
| Camera | Supports 3D Photo & video capture
18mm/F2.0 *Resolution may vary depending on use case |
| Sensors | Two, High-resolution Pass-through cameras Six, World-facing tracking cameras Four, Eye-tracking Cameras Five, Inertial Measurement Units(IMUs) One, Depth sensor One, Flicker sensor |
| Optic (Iris) | Supports iris recognition – Use iris recognition to unlock the device and to enter passwords in certain apps. |
| Audio and Video | Two, 2 Way speaker(Woofer + Tweeter)
Six Microphones array Audio Playback Video Playing Resolution Video Playback (Supports HDR10 and HLG) |
| Battery | Up to 2 hours of general use* Video watching up to 2.5 hours•• Galaxy XR can be used while charging the battery *General Usage (2hr) Disclaimer: General usage tested with Wi-Fi connection turned on, 2D video playback from YouTube playing in a virtual environment, Google Chrome internet browser with three websites open and Google Meet with Avatar setting turned on. Actual battery life varies by network environment, features and apps used, device settings, the number of times charged, and many other factors. |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi 7(802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax/be) BT 5.4 (Up to) |
| Interpupillary Distance (IPD) | 54~70mm
Vision Correction *Prescription lenses are sold separately. Prescription lenses are sold and delivered by . Warranty and technical support queries are handled by . |
| Weight | 545g* (w/ forehead cushion) Weight may vary depending on whether light shield is attached or not Separate battery weighs 302g. *The weight of the product specified above includes the weight of the device with the Forehead cushion only. The weight of the product was measured without other attachments such as Cushion size adjusters and Light shields. |
The specs are pretty good, mostly in line with its main competitor, the Apple Vision Pro. Resolution is very high, and the field of view seems acceptable. 2-2.5 hours of usage is also pretty standard in the industry right now. So it seems a solid premium headset, but it has no standout feature, like the incredible M5 processor of the new Vision Pro. This, not “standing out,” is something that has been a common trait of the whole launch event of this headset.
The price of $1799 is in line with the rumored $1500-$2000. It is half the price of the Apple Vision Pro, but it is still a lot of money. Being in the middle between the Quest 3 price and the Apple Vision Pro price can be either a very good or very bad thing for Samsung and Google. Depending on how the market will react, there are two possible outcomes:
- XR people will think it’s a good compromise between the two options, and will seriously consider it. This is what Samsung is hoping for
- XR people with not enough money will go for the affordable Meta Quest, and XR people with a lot of money will go with the top product, Apple Vision Pro, ignoring the middle choice. This is Samsung’s nightmare.
Anyway, considering that the Quest 3 is struggling to sell at $499, I doubt this headset will sell much: I estimate some hundreds of thousands of units during the first year. It is a dev kit/prosumer headset, exactly as the Vision Pro. So I’m not expecting at all this moving the needle in the XR industry TODAY.
I stress the word “today” because Google and Samsung re-entering XR is actually huge news, and down the line, in a few years, they can release together a cool and affordable headset that may become pretty popular. So this may be the first step of something big. But today, it is something small.
Galaxy XR Controllers sold separately for $250
One of the things we were waiting to discover during this livestream was whether controllers were included in the box. The final answer is no: you have to buy them separately for $250 (currently, there is a 30% discount if you order them together with the headset).
Samsung made a choice very similar to Apple’s. They are clearly prioritizing “spatial computing use cases” like watching movies or productivity with your own computer over gaming. This is not good news for many game studios that were waiting for the launch of Galaxy XR as a potential new market: the fact that controllers are not included in the box means that many users won’t have them. So either you can make a game that works well with hand tracking (which is feasible, e.g., for puzzle games), or you will lose a big slice of the market. Not all games work well without controllers (I’m thinking about shooter games, for instance), though, so for some people this is definitely not good news.
AI, AI, and again AI
Having a unique value proposition is very important when you launch a new product: why should people buy your product instead of the ones of the competition? Google and Samsung identified AI as their killer feature since the first time the headset was unveiled.
For this reason, today’s keynote was a constant mention of AI features. The event started with the presenter talking immediately about AI and introducing XR devices as a way to interact with artificial intelligence. They mentioned AI in 2 out of 3 key principles about Galaxy XR:
They showed AI interacting with Google Maps, then explaining a 2D game that the presenter was playing, then AI creating a video, etc Inside AndroidXR, AI is always with you, helping you either with your real-world context, or with the virtual content that you are playing, or with a mix of the two.
I have to honestly say that most of the examples shown were not so exciting for me as a MR user. I can generate an AI video on my laptop, I don’t need a headset. The same holds for Google Maps: I would never put on a headset to organize a dinner out with my friends. And AI helping me to play a 2D game? Don’t get me started with it. To me, it looked more like a technical showcase of AI integration in a headset than they showing me actual features I would use. Not to mention the fact that I’m not super-excited about Google Gemini’s “eyes” always looking at what I’m doing.
So it’s cool that Gemini is so well integrated into the operating system, and I’m sure AI will have its valid use cases, especially in the enterprise sector, but I still have to find a killer use for consumers.
AI Glasses
Talking about AI, a mention of AI glasses, the hot topic of the moment, was mandatory. But since the topic of the day was selling the headset, glasses were not put under the spotlight (to avoid people not buying the headset to wait for glasses). The only thing that was said is that Google and Samsung are working on AI glasses, and that there is a collaboration ongoing with Warby Parker and Gentle Monster. These are all things we already knew, but it is good to have confirmation that glasses are coming.
Applications
Google confirmed that all Google Play apps can be played on Android XR. This is where Google can use its ecosystem power against Meta: Meta has to ask mobile developers to port their apps for Horizon OS, while Google can offer them out of the box.
Some apps will be explicitly made for XR: these apps will have a specific flag in their app description in Google Play.
There are a few announcements related to content that were a bit exciting. The first is that Netflix will be available on Android XR: GalaxyXR will be, for now, the only headset with an official Netflix app.
The second is Adobe Project Polar, which lets you edit videos on your Android XR headset: you can even put 3D elements in it, and the rendered video will show them from the right point of view.
It seems there is also a cool NBA app incoming…
For the rest, it was a showcase of things we had already seen: immersive Google Maps, 2D photos, spatial videos, etc. It was cool to see that you can convert 2D videos into spatial ones thanks to AI, but this is something already available in other headsets, too.
Immersive avatars
One of my favorite moments has been when they have teased the upcoming avatars, the answer to Apple Personas.
During the keynote, they showed a few people taking part in a video call, some of them from a phone, and others from inside the headset. People in the headset could be seen in two modes by the others. One is using their 3D avatar, like a standard Galaxy cartoon avatar they configured for their profile. The other one is using a reconstruction of their appearance, able to follow all facial expressions, like Apple Personas. These new avatars are called “Likeness” and are coming soon. From the preview, they seemed cool, but still not as detailed as the latest Apple Personas.
The irony of all of this is that Meta was the first company teasing realistic avatar reconstructions and now will be the last one launching them for its headsets…
PC Usage
There was a mention of a “PC Link” you can use to play your flatscreen PC games on a big screen on Android XR. You can interact with these games with your gamepad, but also using your Galaxy XR Controllers. There was no explicit mention of Steam Link or another similar technology to play PCVR Steam games, but I guess this will be available, probably through external apps like Virtual Desktop.
Enterprise use cases
It was refreshing that the event had a clear session dedicated to enterprise use cases. Google and Samsung have been working since day 1 to offer this headset to enterprises. And the cool thing is that the price of the headset for B2B is the same as B2C: $1799, on top of which you can, of course, buy additional Samsung Direct enterprise services.
This is a smart move because at $1799, this headset won’t attract the interest of the average consumer. But companies may be interested in it if it can improve their safety or productivity. $1799 is half of the price of the Vision Pro, and being “comfort” one of the key points of Galaxy XR and one of the pain points of Vision Pro, this headset can compete very well with Vision Pro in enterprise settings. I guess this is the reason why Apple rushed to release a refresh of the Vision Pro with an M5 chipset: with it, it has a clear differentiator; otherwise, Galaxy XR would have risked being superior in too many things.
As someone who also works in developing XR applications for companies, I’m very happy that there is a clear business licensing and attention towards B2B use cases.
A low-key event
I have woken up at 4 am to watch this event live, and to be honest, I have found it a bit underwhelming.
The event was held in what looked like a university classroom, with a very tiny stage. The presenters were super-boring, and I wonder how I didn’t manage to fall asleep during the keynote.
We already knew most of the info shown. Most of the demos were pretty basic, and most of them (like the Google Maps one) were things we already saw in other presentations by Google. There were no disruptive announcements, no killer app, no killer feature. And it seems that Google was more interested in mentioning AI than XR.
Even the attention of the community was not so high: there were fewer than 100 people registered for the livestream, only 15-20K watching it, and my tweets about it had probably a third of the engagement I had while tweeting from Meta Connect.
Probably everyone knew that with this price and this set of features, this headset had no chance to become mainstream, so everything was tuned down to realistic expectations. Which is something I appreciate: it’s useless to create hype when reality can’t meet expectations. It just creates new “XR is dead” articles. But at the same time, I think something more than this could have been done. Meta Connect was a much bigger and more exciting event, for instance. And I felt more excitement for the Meta Ray-Ban Display than I feel now for this Galaxy XR headset.
Anyway, as I’ve said, it is a first step. I hope the first step of a long journey of Google and Samsung in XR, something that may help XR become mainstream one day.
(Header image by Samsung)
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