• Apple has begun selling its Vision Pro headset outside of the US.
• The mixed reality device goes on pre-order in selected countries later this month before landing at the end of June.
• Numerous regions have been included, but the Middle East and Africa have been skipped for some reason.

Apple has this week announced its Vision Pro mixed reality headset going on sale outside of the United States. It took six months after it was unveiled at WWDC last year for the $3 499 device to hit stores in the US, and now it is being made available in other regions.

To that end, Apple is opening up pre-orders in selected regions in a few days, and ensuring devices are ready to purchase before the end of June.

Here the company explained that, “pre-orders for China mainland, Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore beginning this Thursday, June 13, at 6 p.m. PT and availability beginning Friday, June 28. Customers in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom can pre-order Vision Pro beginning Friday, June 28, at 5 a.m. PT, with availability beginning Friday, July 12.”

“We can’t wait for more people to see the impossible become possible, whether working and collaborating with an infinite canvas for apps, reliving treasured memories in three dimensions, watching TV shows and movies in a one-of-a-kind personal cinema, or enjoying brand-new spatial experiences that defy imagination,” added Tim Cook, Apple CEO in a blog post.

While as many as nine countries have been selected for launch, curiously no nation from the Middle East and Africa (MEA) has been chosen.

Much of this may have to do with the asking price, and the niche applications for this piece of hardware, as to why South African iStores are yet to list it for pre-order, but the fact that a country like the United Arab Emirates is not selling the Vision Pro is odd, especially considering the fervour for premium products in the UAE.

Whether we will ever see the Vision Pro launched in SA in an official capacity remains to be seen, but it may take future iterations or a more affordable generation of headsets for it to land locally. There is also the issue of wear-related injuries being reported by some users.

As we have noted while reviewing devices like the PlayStation VR2, wearing such a headset for extended periods of time can prove difficult, and therefore the segment of consumers actually capable of using the Vision Pro on a daily basis is relatively small.

With the entire tech industry now shifting focus purely on AI, it will be interesting to see when Apple readies the next iteration of Vision Pro, and whether it will be earmarked for countries like South Africa.