Apple AR/VR Headset Will Need to be Connected to iPhone or Similar Device [Report]

Apple's rumored AR/VR headset will need to be wirelessly tethered to an iPhone or similar device, according to a new report from The Information. Custom chips designed by Apple will rely on the external device for advanced features, similar to how early versions of the Apple Watch functioned.

Apple completed work last year on the chips, including the key system on a chip (SoC), which has many different components of a device etched on a single piece of silicon, said two people familiar with the situation. The SoC and two other Apple-designed chips for the headset hit a milestone known in the semiconductor industry as tape-out, which means the physical designs of the chips are complete and ready for trial production. It’s a key stage in development of the headset, which The Information previously reported was expected to debut by next year at the earliest, though Apple could push the release back even further.

Notably, Apple appears to have designed an unusually large image sensor for the headset.


The complementary metal-oxide semiconductor image sensor is the chip that converts photons to electrons for digital processing into an image. Apple’s version is unusually large, similar to the size of one of the headset’s lenses, as it’s meant to capture high-resolution image data from a user’s surroundings for AR. TSMC has struggled to produce the chip without defects and has faced low yields during trial production, the person said.

The AR/VR headset won't be unveiled until next year at the earliest. More details in the full report linked below...

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