It’s been a busy 12 months for HTC, and it looks like the VR headset manufacturer has one last trick up its sleeve before the year is out.
Having already announced the HTC Vive Flow and Vive wrist tracker in October 2021 and January 2022, respectively, HTC has taken to Twitter (opens in new tab) to tease the release of another small-form VR headset.
“Go small or go home,” reads the tweet, which features a shadowy image of the new product in question. “We're working on something big… we mean small. It's a new headset!,” HTC then confirmed in the replies section.
A similarly vague press release – describing the HTC Vive Flow as the “first evolution” of the company’s “Proton project” – was sent to TechRadar, suggesting HTC’s next Vive headset could be the so-called second evolution of said proiect.
The HTC Vive Flow is essentially a pair of VR glasses, though despite its innovative form factor, we found that the headset offers mediocre performance and limited immersion for its expensive price tag ($499 / £499 / around AU$675).
HTC’s next Vive product, then, would do well to bring a more capable VR experience to the table. We’d like to see the new headset take the best parts of its predecessor – the Vive Flow’s light and comfortable design remains its biggest strength – and combine them with some more impressive under-the-hood credentials.
It’s hard to say at this stage whether going even smaller on the form front will allow HTC to deliver on that ambition, but the company is definitely bucking the trend by downsizing its product line. Both Meta and ByteDance have bolstered – or are about to bolster – their respective VR offerings with premium-grade headsets, so we’re intrigued to see the target market HTC has in mind for its comparably bite-sized new project.
For more VR-related content, check out our roundup of the best VR headsets to buy right now. Alternatively, read up on the latest leaks surrounding Meta’s mysterious Project Cambria headset.
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