As per an Instagram update from Meta’s CTO Andrew Bosworth, it appears Meta is not discontinuing VR support for Horizon Worlds after all, which should be a significant comfort to, like, five users.
“We have made the decision, just today in fact, to keep Horizon Worlds operational in VR,” Bosworth mentioned during an Instagram Stories Q&A after a user of the app expressed they were “heartbroken” over the announcement.
A Meta spokesperson validated Bosworth’s statements to TechCrunch.
Earlier this year, Meta had hinted at stopping support for the social metaverse application on its Quest virtual reality headsets, which marked a considerable retreat for an app that Meta once saw as vital for social interactions in VR. Eventually, it became clear that very few users actually wanted to socialize in VR. On Tuesday, Meta announced on its community forums that Horizon Worlds would transition to web and mobile only on June 15, but that declaration was swiftly retracted.
Even though Horizon Worlds will now still be available through Quest, the initial intent to shut it down highlights that the metaverse — or at least its envisioned version in VR — turned out to be a void where Reality Labs funding was wasted. That branch at Meta has incurred a loss of $73 billion since 2021, the year Meta changed its name from Facebook. As previously mentioned, you would have to spend $1 million every day for 200 years to exhaust that sum. (Reality Labs also encompasses expenses on augmented reality products like smart glasses and some AI research.)
According to IDC, a technology market research firm, Meta’s Quest headset sales declined by 16% year-over-year from 2024 to 2025, making it look improbable that this hardware will ever compete effectively with smartphones. Meta isn’t the only one facing challenges in creating compelling virtual reality — Apple had to reduce production of its $3,500 Vision Pro headset due to insufficient demand.
In response to this downturn, Meta executed major cuts in its Reality Labs division in January, affecting over 1,500 employees and closing several game studios. There are rumors that Meta is contemplating another significant round of layoffs, potentially affecting 20% of its workforce.
While Meta will keep supporting Horizon Worlds for the Quest headset, the company intends to emphasize the mobile experience. Bosworth remarked in a podcast with journalist Alex Heath that Horizon had shifted its focus to mobile since it had a more suitable product-market fit there.
“There’s a significantly larger audience in mobile, and it’s seeing a very positive response there,” Bosworth commented regarding the app. “[The team] is having to develop everything twice — they’re developing it once for mobile devices, and again for VR. There’s a straightforward way to enhance their productivity, which is simply to let them develop for mobile.”
Mobile analytics company Appfigures informed TechCrunch that the Horizon Worlds mobile application has reached 45 million total downloads globally across iOS and Google Play, with 1.5 million downloads thus far in 2026. That represents a 53% year-over-year increase compared to the previous year when the Horizon Worlds application totaled around 983,000 downloads at this time.
Nevertheless, Appfigures estimates that total consumer spending on the app has only reached $1.1 million, which is negligible compared to the scale of Meta’s metaverse investments.
Bosworth is correct that there’s a greater potential for Horizon Worlds on mobile than on the Quest headset — but Meta will need to witness significantly more consumer spending for the app to demonstrate it is a worthwhile investment.