Apple Looks to Sell Vision Pro to Overseas Consumers

Will Apple’s mixed-reality headset be more popular overseas than it was in America?

The tech giant is reportedly trying to find out.

Apple is preparing to begin selling its almost $3,500 Vision Pro in non-U.S. markets, Bloomberg News reported Monday (May 13).

Sources tell the news outlet that the company is flying hundreds of international store employees to its headquarters to learn how to demonstrate the device, with plans to bring the Vision Pro to overseas markets for the first time after its Worldwide Developers Conference next month.

According to the report, Apple hasn’t told employees in the training sessions where exactly the device will be available. However, the company is training workers from Australia, China, France, Germany, Japan, Singapore and South Korea, which Bloomberg says suggests those areas could be some of the first international markets for the Vision Pro.

As that report notes, the Vision Pro was supposed to usher in what Apple CEO has dubbed the era of “spatial computing.” So far, however, it hasn’t taken off the way the company’s other devices have.

PYMNTS has contacted Apple for comment but has not yet gotten a reply.

Apple debuted the Vision Pro in February along with 600 new apps. The rollout led retailers like J.Crew and Lowe’s to debut their own virtual/augmented reality apps.

However, the company has struggled to make the Vision Pro a hit. Early adopters complained of discomfort and nausea while wearing the device, while the $3,500 price tag makes the headset less affordable to consumers dealing with economic uncertainty.

Writing about Apple earlier this month, PYMNTS’ Karen Webster argued that the company’s troubles with the Vision Pro were part of a broader problem:

“Wearables were a hit for a time, but now not so much. The HomePod was an outright flop. Like most AR/VR headsets, the Vision Pro seems a niche product that got a PR and fanboy pop but seems to struggle to gain adoption. The Connected Car, billed as Apple’s biggest flagship product since the iPhone, was shuttered after a decade-long attempt to make it road-and consumer-ready. And don’t even try to ask Siri where Apple was when AI took off in late 2022.

“Unless Apple has another transformative product innovation hiding up its sleeves, Apple’s growth is entirely dependent upon people buying the next generation of iPhone, upgrading them and using them,” Webster added. “The same form factor, more or less, that they have been buying for the last 17 years.”