Meta just announced that it is pulling the plug on Horizon Worlds for VR devices, with the final shutdown which is set for June 15, 2026. You will still find the app on mobile, but it will vanish from the Quest Store by the end of March. That’s a pretty big shift in Meta’s whole metaverse plan.
After the VR version goes dark, Horizon Worlds will live on as a mobile-only app. But users are also losing a bunch of in-app perks—digital assets, credits, avatar stuff—the works.
Zuckerberg’s Metaverse Vision faces reality check
Back in 2021, Mark Zuckerberg pitched the metaverse as the next big thing for how we work, hang out, and play—basically, he wanted to make a whole 3D digital universe, and Facebook even rebranded as Meta to drive the point home. But even with all the buzz and money poured in, the platform just didn’t pick up steam.
Low adoption and technical challenges
Horizon Worlds never hit any big numbers. Reports say active users never even passed a few hundred thousand per month. For a company like Meta, that’s barely a blip. A lot of people complained that the platform felt empty, lacked must-see experiences, and kept running into annoying technical issues. That did not exactly help things.
Massive losses mount to USD 80 billion
Then you’ve got the financial side. Meta’s Reality Labs—which handles all the metaverse and VR work—racked up close to $80 billion in losses since 2020. That’s huge. The losses pushed Meta to rethink its plans. Earlier this year, the company laid off over a thousand Reality Labs employees, and it sounds like more cuts might be on the way.
Ex-employee blames management decisions
Even some folks from inside are not shy about calling out the mess. Vasuman Moza, who used to work at Reality Labs, blamed middle management for not listening to users or developers. He said the company killed off useful tools and made teams chase after ideas no one really wanted. According to Moza, all these choices just dragged the metaverse project down.
Meta shifts focus to AI and smart glasses
They are further betting big on AI and smart gadgets like the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses. Those are actually selling—millions sold worldwide, which is light years ahead of Horizon Worlds’ numbers. Plus, Meta’s pouring resources into its Superintelligence Lab to stay relevant as AI heats up. Looks like Meta’s new future isn’t so virtual after all.