Samsung ended the launch of the Fold 6 and Galaxy Watch Ultra this week with a tease that its new XR platform is “coming this year.” A new report provides more details on when that Android XR headset from Samsung might launch.
According to Business Insider, the current internal timeline for Samsung-built and Qualcomm-powered Android XR headset — codenamed “Moohan” — involves a developer version releasing in October. This will be followed by the consumer launch in March of 2025.
There are no other details today about upcoming availability, including how it will be announced and what exactly will be shown off. For example, will there be a consumer-facing keynote as October serves as the public announcement? Or will the hardware be shrouded in secrecy and be announced by Samsung at a later date, with the fall focusing on Android XR to encourage developers to optimize their apps?
The headset launch was initially planned for Q1 of this year, with the Apple Vision Pro coming out in February, but it has been repeatedly pushed back, with company leaders “fearing the device isn’t yet good enough to dazzle users.”
Looking ahead:
There is internal speculation that Samsung will be the first to also build glasses with Google’s AR software, according to two employees familiar with the matter.
Google itself does not have plans on making consumer XR hardware. One employee in today’s report said, “Google is out of the first-party game for glasses for the foreseeable future.” In January, Google laid off its first-party augmented reality hardware team, which was presumably working on Iris. That project was the result of the 2020 North acquisition and canceled in June of 2023.
This decision might help convince partners that Google won’t compete with its own hardware in the near future.
Google is making display prototypes with the microLED company (Raxium) it bought in 2022 to showcase its software to partners. (The Project Astra glasses demo at I/O could be seen as one example of that rather than an actual project direction.) Last month, as part of the broader reshuffle, it brought that display team into the Android XR division.
With Samsung setting the date this week, things are hopefully now on track and won’t be delayed again.
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