- Horizon Feed is ending Meta
- The answer is mixed since Navigator is replacing it.
- Some users are wondering if this is a sign of more Horizon-related closures
Your Meta Quest 3 is getting a UI overhaul again, and this could be an update that VR users will appreciate.
Currently, when you turn on your headset, your default landing experience (the first screen you see) would be Horizon Feed. This social window highlights popular Horizon worlds, apps, and what your contacts are doing; and it’s a window that I and many other users instantly close, so we can access the actual games and content we want to access.
So Meta has announced that starting with the v85 update, players will boot directly into the Navigator. This is the floating UI meta adopted last year, which puts a greater emphasis on mixed reality with simpler floating icons, as well as a simple bar for switching between your library, home, social contacts, and the app store.
It’s not perfect, but Navigator is generally a much more useful intro screen than Horizon Feed, so we hope this is an update that most users will appreciate, even if it’s not a major one.
Meta also announced that it will be completely shutting down Horizon Feed with this update.
In general, people haven’t been a fan of this constant extra step of having to close Horizon Feed when using their headphones.
This post from last year is literally titled “Tired of closing the Horizon Feed + People window, every time it starts,” while another asks for advice on how to “Remove Horizon Feed from the menu.”
It seems Meta is well aware of how little users want to interact with Horizon Feed, as in its announcement it said of the feature that it “has not historically driven strong entitlement conversion”; Basically, people generally don’t access the worlds or games you show through the feed itself.
Some people are now hoping that Meta will go a step further, responding to the change by saying, “That gives me hope that one day the doomed Horizon ecosystem will disappear entirely. The Quest would be a much better device without it.”
Following the recent news that Meta has closed studios as it shifts focus from VR to its headset, this prospect seems more likely, although even as someone who hasn’t been terribly impressed by its metaverse efforts so far, I’m worried that the end of the Horizon ecosystem could be accompanied by a much broader demise of Quest – something I don’t want, even if I’m pinning my VR hopes on Steam Frame for now.
It’s a strange time in the world of virtual reality, but this news from Horizon Feed at least begins to return things to a state of normality. When we don’t know what will happen next, we can at least count on Meta to make another UI change.
Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to receive news, reviews and opinions from our experts in your feeds. Be sure to click the Follow button!
And of course you can also follow TechRadar on TikTok for news, reviews, unboxings in video form and receive regular updates from us on WhatsApp also.
