Report: Mixed-reality headset will draw most of Apple’s focus in 2023

Enlarge / Apple introduced an all-new ruggedized Apple Watch Ultra in 2022, but updates for the Apple Watch and many of Apple's other products will be more low-key in 2023. The company is gearing up to release a new mixed-reality headset. (credit: Samuel Axon)

Apple is still planning to launch a new mixed-reality headset sometime in 2023, according to Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman. The headset will run its own operating system (currently dubbed "xrOS"), and Gurman says there are still "many kinks to work out," which is typical of any new hardware and software from any company.

Aside from its ever-changing release window—previous estimates said the headset could be announced as early as this month, which has now changed to "spring 2023 announcement, fall 2023 launch"—there aren't many new details about the headset in the latest report. What's coming into focus, though, is the extent to which the headset launch will divert resources from elsewhere in the company this year.

Gurman says the main casualties will be the iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and AirPod lineups—all of these lineups received significant updates in 2022, and the report indicates that most updates this year will be mostly minor "spec bump" updates. New iPad Pros supposedly won't launch until 2024. Apple's established operating systems, including iOS, iPadOS, and macOS, will all have "fewer major changes than originally planned."

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