Still thinking about getting a decent VR headset? Holiday deals are starting to emerge.
The existing Oculus VR hardware, both PC and mobile, is getting a Black Friday price drop, joining other VR deals on PlayStation VR and HTC’s pricey Vive Pro.
Oculus Go: $179 ($20 off)
The Oculus Go, released in March, is a rock-solid mobile standalone headset that’s perfect for casual viewing of videos or short immersive experiences. While $179 is a pretty decent price, and the first real discount the Oculus Go has gotten since its debut earlier this year (as far as I know), a 10 percent discount isn’t exactly exciting.
I still use Oculus Go as my go-to casual VR viewer for 360 degree videos, and its display and headphone-free spatial audio is excellent. But it’s a stationary VR viewer, lacking “six degree of freedom” full motion tracking. Consider that the full-motion-enabled PlayStation VR headset, with a few games, is on sale for $200, but you need a PS4 for that. And, if you have a Samsung Galaxy phone or Google Daydream-ready phone, you can always pop it in a less-expensive Gear VR or Google Daydream View for a similar experience.
Oculus Rift with Touch controllers: $349 ($50 off)
The two-year-old Oculus Rift may still be the best PC-connected VR system, with excellent wireless controllers that offer precision movement and a huge library of games and apps.
But $50 off the Rift deal isn’t that exciting, specially with plenty of VR hardware seeing price drops, and the Rift having seen greater relative deals in holidays past. But hey, 50 bucks is 50 bucks.
The Oculus deals kick in Nov. 22 at 11:59 p.m. in the USA, Canada, UK, EU, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Taiwan. They continue until November 26 at 11:59 p.m. According to Facebook, the Oculus deals will be offered at Oculus.com, Walmart, Amazon, Best Buy, Argos, Digitech, CoolBlue, Newegg and others.
Keep in mind that the Oculus Quest, Facebook’s next-gen mobile standalone VR system, is coming next year. You may also question whether you’re interested in being connected to a Facebook-owned VR system, but maybe you’re fine with that. Both the Rift and Go have their merits, and are still worth using. But at the end of 2018, with a lot more VR hardware on the horizon, now may be a good time to wait.