HTC has announced a $200 price drop for the HTC Vive. Going forward, its MSRP will be $599, putting it within striking range of the $499 Oculus Rift and $399 PlayStation VR.
The move has come just weeks after the Oculus Rift received a $200 price drop of its own. It has since seen a surge of demand both online and in-store spurring growth for the industry.
Following the announcement, HTC stated that it hopes to “make VR more accessible to the mass market”. In this effort it will begin including a free trial to of Viveport with all purchases, providing access to several titles per month that have been curated through Steam.
HTC also labeled its headset as “the best virtual reality system”, showing confidence in its current positioning in the market where at the very least it’s considered to have the best tracking solution and immersion potential.
HTC Vive is currently the least popular of the three mainstream virtual reality headsets, much of which is due to its previous price point of $799 where it sat uncomfortably outside affordability for most consumers. This price drop could prove to be an important point in history not only for HTC’s VR efforts, but virtual reality as a whole.
