YouTube said in January that it had no immediate plans to support Apple's Vision Pro headset. Now it said the Vision Pro app is 'on the roadmap'.
Google is reportedly planning to develop a YouTube app for Apple Vision Pro. According to the statement, YouTube is already developing an internal Vision Pro application, and the company states that YouTube is optimised for Safari as a temporary solution. However, YouTube said last month that it had no immediate plans to support the Vision Pro headset. The U-turn comes after Christian Selig, developer of the Apollo app, released an unofficial YouTube app for Vision Pro.
YouTube is coming to Vision Pro
"We don't have any specific plans to share at this time, but we can confirm that a Vision Pro app is on our roadmap" said YouTube spokesperson Jessica Gibby. Despite the launch of Vision Pro with more than 600 native apps, YouTube said as recently as 19 January that it had no plans for a Vision Pro app.
It seems that something happened in the last two weeks that changed the company's mind. According to one theory, Apple's mixed reality headset has sold better than expected, despite its staggering price of $3,500. In the US alone, Vision Pro is rumoured to have sold more than 200,000 units.
Of course, this sales figure means a very small market for an application developer. Therefore, there is a second and more likely theory: YouTube realising that an independent developer is filling its niche. Christian Selig, the developer of the now defunct Apollo for Reddit, has released an unofficial third-party YouTube app called Juno. Finally, YouTube supports 3D and 360-degree videos, but neither currently work on Vision Pro. It is not yet clear whether the company plans to include them in its app.