Pico Interactive today announced it’s getting ready to reveal “a new product” this month, promising to boost your “MR/VR experience to the next level.”

The device is slated to get its big reveal on August 20th. An image obtained by Antony Vitillo of Skarred Ghost maintains it will be revealed at 14:00 China Standard Time (local time here).


The company also teased the new headset in a separate X post yesterday, with the hashtags ‘Pico 4’ and ‘Upgrade’:

The tease suggests it will likely be another XR headset and not an optional accessory, although the mention of ‘upgrade’ isn’t conclusive.

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Provided it’s indeed a new headset, a possible candidate could be the rumored Pico 4S, which was the subject of a leaked controller design back in March.

Less likely is Pico 5 or prospective Pico 5 Pro Max, both of which have been rumored since late last year. Since then, Pico parent company Byte Dance issued wide-reaching layoffs, which may have dampened its consumer ambitions—at least outside of Asia and possibly Europe where it has launched previous headsets.

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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

    Not reported by YouTuber and Tech Analyst SadlyItsBradley?

  • Hey mom, I'm on Road To VR!

  • Andrew Jakobs

    I thought the group-app tease was very funny. An upgraded Pico 4, with the new XR2+ gen2 soc and perfected lenses would be great. If it has OLED(like blacks) displays and eyetracking (in the base model) it would be excellent, but I doubt it. It will have better passthrough and new controllers without a tracking halo. Also hope they improved the default facegasket so you don't have to buy a thirdparty version. Still don't understand why no standalone headset manufacturer had gone for a BoboVR magnetic battery system as that is still very welcome, would have been nice to see a standard where you can use those batteries on multiple headsets.

    • Bob

      Almost ten years on from the announcement of the Oculus CV1 the market still has no consumer focused headset at sub $999 that has all of the following: Index FOV, OLED displays with extremely low persistence, custom pancake-type lenses with edge-to-edge clarity, High Dynamic Range and most importantly, eye tracking with varifocal capability – which by the way was heavily featured in at a connect conference all the way back in 2018 by Michael Abrash. Without true varifocal, VR headsets will never ever give that feeling of being actually there in "another world".

      Considering we're now heading into 2025, and every single consumer focused headset right now is either missing something – like OLED and HDR – or compromising on something else, that "perfect" expensive yet still within reach of affordability (unlike the Vision Pro) headset does not exist.

      The ultimate immersion VR headset that combines all those features listed above to really give you the feeling that you're inside the world rather than looking at one packaged up in a relatively small and sleek form factor (like the Quest 3/Pico 3) with excellent, excellent vertical FOV (and horizontal too), and gorgeous 10 bit color HDR and true HRTF audio. And to bind all of that together within an incredible operating system where UX is off the charts.

      This was the headset that I'd assume many enthusiasts on here and followers of the industry was expecting in 2024/2025. Unfortunately, this isn't going to be a reality for many, many, many more years.

      • Thud

        On the shoulders of giants. Every advancement is built on the shoulders of those that came before. It's a progression and we certainly are progressing at a good rate. Not a fan of Meta but their R&D crew is making great advancements. Bigscreen beyond made a major leap towards small form factor through pancake lenses and OLED. Resolutions have reached near retina levels. Soon someone will bring it all together in one headset. I don't think this one though. But we can hope.

        • Andrew Jakobs

          Problem with Bigscreen is that it is only for one specific person (or if you're lucky more with the same IPD/faceshape in your household), and it relies on lighthouse tracking, which means you can't just take it with you and start playing almost immediately on another location. Yes lighthouse tracking is great, but inside out tracking has come to almost, if not really, the sane quality tracking. For me my PCVR headset is still the Vive Pro (1, wireless)/RTX2060super, but to be honest, the Pico 4 I also own is looking to be much better, and certainly much faster to start to play with.

          • Thud

            It's going to be interesting when BSB's start showing upon the used market.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Yes, I'll bet more then enough people will just buy one used without even checking if it is for their IPD, and not knowing you'd better order a new custom made facegasket.

      • Andrew Jakobs

        Because they had a demo for a prototype in 2018 for varifocal displays doesn't mean they could have easily put that into a consumergrade headset, just like all the other options. Yeah they might seem easy to implement on their own, but integrating them all into one headset and at a low price is still a hard thing to do. Also the big problem is still the needed processing power to drive your dream consumer headset is still waning, even a 4090 has trouble driving a dual 4k display with 90+ fps with AAA type of graphics, and as long as 4090 power GPU's aren't at the max price of $300-$400 there really is no real reason to even try to bring your dream consumer headset to the market. Ofcourse we all would like to see your dream headset for sub $999, but that's just being unrealistic, sadly advances aren't going that fast, coupled with lowering prices of those components. But we'll get there.

    • Dave

      I can't stand BoboVR and all the accessories it's impacting accessiblity. I hate all of that stuff. I tried the Apple Vision Pro in Las Vegas and the cloth strap which cupped your head was incredibly comfortable. The weight wasn't an issue for the 40 minute demo, so really the only thing for me for these new headsets is to get the weight down and not to add more support. I think if the battery lasts 3 hours or more, that's honestly enough for most folks, just give a wired connection to charge, no big deal. I really think people will look at accessories like the BoboVR and, unless you are a VR enthusiast I'm sure most folks will think, no thank you, I'll skip this generation, I can't be dealing with the hassle.

      • Andrew Jakobs

        I really hate having to have a cable running down your neck to a battery, that impacting accessibility much more. The weight of a Pico 4 with bobovr batteries or just the original strap also isn't a problem for the 2+ hours the initial battery holds out. The BoboVR accessories are less a hassle as the AVP with its crappy strap and separate battery.
        I think you are one of the few that actually have a problem with the BoboVR (or other third party) accessories, most people think those accessories should have come standard with the headset.
        Any wire down your body is an impact on immersion, as the wire can get caught in whatever, have had it happen many times with the wire needed to power the wireless module for my Vive Pro, with the battery slipping from my belt/pocket also more then once, and let's not forget the extra time needed to connect the wire to the battery and putting the battery in the right spot on your belt/pocket and maybe even clip the wire to your clothes. No thank you, battery should be part of the headset/headstrap.

  • Dave

    Pico promises "MR/VR experience to the next level." but the article thinks we're getting Pico 4S. Something has to give, as my impression of the Pico 4S wasn't at all next level and is closer to the current Quest 3.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Well, next level compared to the Pico 4. Or maybe they are using better passthrough camera's on the new headset. Maybe they also slightly increased the resolution of the displays, which at the moment already has a higher pixelcount horizontal and a slightly less vertically as the Q3.
      But as I said, I'll bet the reference is to their own current headset.

  • Andrew Jakobs

    On facebook I saw a new video by Pico that it will be called 'Pico 4 Ultra'.