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Omdia: Consumers to spend $3.2bn on VR this year

Omdia: Consumers to spend $3.2bn on VR this year

Over $3bn is going to be spent on virtual reality hardware and software in 2020.

That's according to research firm Omdia, which also believes that people will spent $3.2bn on the segment this year. Of that figure, $1.1m will be splashed on content. The company reports that by 2025, this figure is going to rise just under fourfold to $4bn, with 90 per cent of this figure coming from the games space.

In 2025, Omdia says that hardware and software spend combined will be in the region of $10bn, around three times 2020.

By this point, there will be 45m VR headsets "actively" being used by consumers. In 2020, 3.3m standalone headsets are going to be sold, outstripping the number of smartphone and tethered hardware for the first time. In total, Omdia reckons that 6.4m headsets will be sold this year.

Part of the reason for this increase in sales is how standalone hardware is making VR more accessible. Users can have high-quality virtual reality experiences, without needing an expensive games PC or console. At the moment, Facebook's Oculus Quest is driving this segment, with around 48 per cent of sales, a figure that is forecast to drop to 35 per cent in 2025 as more Chinese companies enter the fray.


PCGamesInsider Contributing Editor

Alex Calvin is a freelance journalist who writes about the business of games. He started out at UK trade paper MCV in 2013 and left as deputy editor over three years later. In June 2017, he joined Steel Media as the editor for new site PCGamesInsider.biz. In October 2019 he left this full-time position at the company but still contributes to the site on a daily basis. He has also written for GamesIndustry.biz, VGC, Games London, The Observer/Guardian and Esquire UK.