Microsoft announced to enterprise partners last week that it’s discontinuing its latest AR headset, HoloLens 2, and pulling the plug on support updates at the end of 2027, leaving many to question whether the Redmond tech giant is shelving the platform altogether.

One such enterprise partner was Jens Lauritsen, Chief Product Officer of the Copenhagen-based XR startup Virsabi, who published the email from Microsoft detailing their plans.

In it (seen below), Microsoft announced the “Last Time Buy” for HoloLens 2, noting that remaining stock is on a first come, first served basis.

Additionally, Microsoft says HoloLens 2 will continue to receive security updates through December 31st, 2027, further noting the original 2016-era HoloLens will receive its final servicing update on December 10th, 2024.

Image by Road to VR

Released in 2019, that 2027 end date isn’t a terrible lifespan for HoloLens 2—or any mobile device for that matter. However if any company announced it was putting out a product to pasture without announcing a clear follow-up, it should rightfully raise a few eyebrows.

While purely speculative, some of it may have to do with the company shifting resources to refine HoloLens 2 into a military platform for its contract with the U.S. Army, worth up to $22 billion—creating what is also known as Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS).

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Tailoring HoloLens 2 into the Army’s own IVAS has proven to be a big challenge though, and it may even be replaced. A recent Breaking Defense report suggests the U.S. Army is preparing a new open competition, called “IVAS Next”, which could mean Microsoft could be replaced if it’s outcompeted by other manufacturers.

It’s uncertain whether Microsoft shelving enterprise versions of HoloLens 2 is at all related, however we’re bound to learn more later this year when the Pentagon starts with official solicitation for IVAS Next.

The Microsoft message published by Lauritsen follows below:

Dear Valued Mixed Reality Partner,

In follow-up to previous communication regarding the Mixed Reality Partner Program and HoloLens 2, we have additional information to share about HoloLens device availability and support.

HoloLens 2 Device Availability & Support update

-We are now announcing a ‘Last Time Buy’ for HoloLens 2.

-HoloLens 2 will be sold by Microsoft and its authorized channels subject to availability and sold on a first-come, first-serve basis. Please contact your authorized reseller or the Microsoft Store Business Desk for availability and ordering.

-HoloLens 2 devices will continue receiving updates to address critical security issues and software regressions that impact major functionality through December 31, 2027.

-The HoloLens 2 device warranty remains unchanged, specific to the device model purchased. Customer Service & Developer Support remains unchanged.

HoloLens (1st Gen) Device Support

-HoloLens (1st Gen) entered Long-Term Servicing (LTS) state on November 23, 2021, and the final servicing update will be December 10, 2024.

-After December 10, 2024, HoloLens (1st Gen) devices will continue to function, however will no longer receive security updates or technical support.

-There is no out-of-warranty support or inventory for device exchange. Customers are encouraged to purchase HoloLens 2 if a replacement device is needed.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • ViRGiN

    Competition is great!
    can't wait for birth of high end, uncompressed, display port PCAR/PCXR; PCVR just doesn't cut it anymore.

  • ApocalypseShadow

    It clearly wasn't going anywhere. Pushed when everyone else was doing VR. They brought it to E3 with Minecraft and then backed off because the price was too high and the POV terrible. Pivoted to other places like the military and it still isn't at a standard worth using when everyone else has caught up and surpassed them in AR.

    Chock it up to another blunder from their phone, MP3 player, Windows VR fire sale, Xbox sales and so on.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      The difference to Windows phone, Zune and Xbox is that iPhones/Android, iPod and PlayStation/Nintendo Switch exist(ed) as more successful implementations. But nobody managed to release see-through AR glasses yet that were anywhere near useful/valuable enough to attract at least business customers, despite many trying, burning billions.

      Meta just showed the impressive Orion glasses, and if as planned they release a version device by 2030, it will launch 14/11 years after Hololens 1/2. During the early consumer VR days pretty much everybody was overly optimistic regarding technical progress, market acceptance and overcoming annoyances, and AR seemed like the "VR plus five years" option. Now it's more "everything moves at half the expected speed at most", and AR "VR plus 10 to 20 years". So not necessarily a blunder Microsoft could have prevented, AR glasses are just much harder than expected.

      Whether dropping WMR was a blunder depends on whether one sees Meta's Quest as a more successful implementation, or proof that the tech isn't far enough for VR either to not fail except for in a few small niches, demonstrated by Meta selling at cost, losing billions each year and still only gathering around 10mn active users in almost a decade. Which their twitter alternative Threads achieved within 7h after launch.

      • ApocalypseShadow

        Microsoft could have been leaders in multiple areas but end up being followers. The idea of multiple companies producing headsets was a good idea to have competition and at least some fair prices. It just was not executed well.

        They have the money, they have tech know-how, they have the patents, they have haptic knowledge, they had a tracking camera with Kinect and they have plenty of developers. Even before the publisher grabs. Microsoft made no games for WVR. They had a tech demo with Halo. Only recently was VR supported like with FS. No Halo VR, no Gears VR, no Forza VR, etc. They bought Bethesda, Inxile, Compulsion, Ninja Theory, etc and killed all their VR efforts in one swoop. But expected their headsets to sell. If you don't make games, and none of their other headset manufactures made games either, how was their headsets supposed to sell?

        Microsoft screwed VR and gamers by taking away those companies that did VR. Now they run away and are making their VR headsets bricks. Hololens has the jump. But ended up in the lake. No real support, no reduction in pricing while improving the tech and POV.

        Microsoft blew it.

        • Christian Schildwaechter

          We'll see if/how much Microsoft blew it. They screwed WMR users/partners and won't support VR on either PC or Xbox, which looks like failure to VR user, while their shareholders probably see it as not repeating Meta's costly mistakes. But more importantly Microsoft isn't out of the game yet. And I'm not talking about military Hololens remains one day resurrecting their XR hardware.

          Microsoft was never a hardware company, they initially made all money from OS and software sales. Over the last decade they moved towards services like Azure, Office365 subscriptions, game pass and now AI. And bought a huge empire of extremely valuable gaming brands.

          Currently XR is a lot about hardware, but over time HMDs will get fast and cheap enough, and mostly exchangeable. Then the focus will switch to content. Computers, phones or TVs are mostly exchangeable today, but just look at how much Disney makes from owning/milking their Disney, Star Wars and Marvel franchises. It's a (very) long term perspective, but in a world where a connected metaverse has replaced isolated vendor app silos, companies like Disney, Microsoft or Epic with the content drawing people in will dominate, not those making exchangeable hardware.

  • Foreign Devil

    Hey Microsoft has to pay for a whole nuclear plant to be re-built on 3 mile island that will serve only their energy needs! They don't have money for XR!

  • sfmike

    Why I won't ever buy another Microsoft product as they never support any of their products or services properly. Quarterly profits are all they care about and customer service and satisfaction is just an annoyance to be ignored unless they are lying about it in a bogus ad.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Not supporting it properly? They support the Hololens much longer than Meta has supported the Go, Rift or Quest 1.

  • RIP

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      Hopefully not. Magic Leap in effect time-bombed the Magic Leap One with a hard wired security check that requires online authentication every six months. They'll shut down their web services on December 31st, which will immediately remove core functionality incl. the capability to run apps, and six month later the last Magic Leap one will refuse to even boot, turning them all into bricks.

      AFAIK Microsoft "only" drops support and won't provide security updates after 2027, but there should be nothing stopping users from using it in that state as long as the hardware doesn't break down. With people still running decades old Apple II or Commodore 64, requiring only occasional capacitor replacements, that can be a long time, enough to bridge the time until e.g. Orion or other similar see-through HMDs from Apple, Samsung or others reach the market.

      We need this as a backup in case Magic Leap finally runs out of willing investors and has again time-bombed the Magic Leap Two in a way that cannot be fixed with software updates. So let's hope Hololens will not rest, but continue to work in peace.