Virtual reality can be a costly proposition. The Oculus Rift can be pre-ordered for US$599 (about CA$850) and the upcoming HTC Vive is expected to fall in the same price range. If you’re looking for cheaper, the consumer version of the Samsung Gear VR headset goes for US$99 (CA$140) but you’ll need a Samsung smartphone to go with it. Even cheaper is the Google Cardboard VR viewer. First announced at Google I/O 2014, Google today announced that it has now shipped more than 5 million of its inexpensive cardboard viewer.
With just Cardboard and the smartphone in your pocket, you can travel to faraway places and visit imagined worlds. Since then everyone from droid lovers and Sunday edition subscribers, to big kids and grandmas have been able to enjoy VR—often for the very first time.
More impressive is how interest in Google Cardboard has picked up in recent months. Google announced last May that it had shipped a million sets to date. That means that 4 million more sets have left Google warehouses in the last 9 months alone!
More than 25 million Cardboard apps have also been downloaded in the last 19 months. Of those, 10 million were downloaded in the last two months alone. The top five apps are Chair in a Room, Vrse, Lamper VR: Firefly Rescue, Caaaaard-board! and Proton Pulse.
Google promises that “more projects that bring creative, entertaining and educational experiences to mobile VR” are coming soon! Could the company soon get into the VR hardware business as some rumours suggest?
Source : Google Blog