Apple's Vision Pro spatial computing headset goes on sale in just a few short weeks but you'll have to go to the United States to buy it with no firm confirmation of when a global launch will take place. But while Apple has kept quiet on specifics, a new report by a normally well-connected supply chain analyst hints that it might be aiming for an international release sooner rather than later.
Customers in the United States will be able to buy the Vision Pro starting February 2, but those who live elsewhere might be able to get their hands on it sooner than they might have feared after analyst Ming-Chi Kuo shared details today that he believes Apple "is likely to release Vision Pro outside the U.S. Market before WWDC 2024."
Such a move would mean that international Vision Pro sales would begin within months, although it isn't clear how many countries Kuo believes Apple will target with the initial expansion.
Coming to a country near you soon?
Ming-Chi Kuo was writing in a piece posted to the Medium blogging platform when he made the claim, and he believes that the global nature of WWDC will be enough to push Apple to have more headsets available to more people ahead of time. Vision Pro, perhaps unsurprisingly, is set to be a focus for Apple at the event designed to help app developers build better apps.
"Apple plans to share more development details about visionOS with global developers at WWDC 2024," Ming-Chi Kuo said. "If Apple can launch Vision Pro in non-U.S. markets before WWDC 2024, it would be beneficial for promoting the global development ecosystem of visionOS."
As for why Apple hasn't yet brought Vision Pro to more countries and is instead focusing on the United States at launch, Ming-Chi Kuo says that there are three aspects to the decision starting with the fact that it simply doesn't have many of the headsets to go around. Second, Apple is thought to be keen to ensure that the sales process for the Vision Pro goes smoothly before it tries to expand it to more territories. Beyond that, Apple needs to "modify the algorithms to comply with regulations in other countries," he says.
The analyst goes on to say that "the sooner the above issues are resolved, the sooner Vision Pro will be available in more countries," and it appears he believes WWDC will be enough to push Apple to make that happen. After all, a worldwide developer conference isn't quite the same if the main focus of the event isn't available globally.
All eyes on WWDC
If Apple follows its usual cadence we can likely expect it to hold the WWDC event in early June which means global sales of the Vision Pro would likely need to have begun the month before. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman previously hinted that Apple is aiming for China, the United Kingdom, and Canada as its next trio of Vision Pro launches but time will tell whether that is accurate.
Back in the United States, the Vision Pro headset will start at $3,499 for a model with 256GB of storage while more capacity is expected to be an option with 1TB rumored to be the high-end. Apple is already thought to be working on a cheaper variant, but that is still some way off being ready for release which means potential buyers will have to hand over a pretty penny to take Apple's flavor of spatial computing for a whirl for some time yet.
