XR Industry News

Samsung’s upcoming mixed reality headset Project Moohan has largely been out of the spotlight since its unveiling late last year. According to South Korean outlet Newsworks (Korean), the headset’s launch could be right around the corner.

Citing industry sources, Project Moohan is reportedly set to be featured at Samsung’s upcoming Unpacked event, which is expected to take place in South Korea on September 29th.

The report maintains the headset is set to launch soon thereafter, coming first to South Korea on October 13th, and later to global markets. There’s no word on when or how the alleged global rollout will work.

The device is expected to be priced somewhere between ₩2.5 and ₩4 million South Korean won, or around $1,800 and $2,900 USD, Newsworks maintains.

While markedly cheaper than Apple Vision Pro, which still sells for its early 2024 launch price of $3,500, that still puts Moohan pretty squarely on the prosumer end of the spectrum.

Ostensibly looking to serve up competition to Vision Pro, Project Moohan is set to be the first mixed reality headset to run Google’s Android XR operating system.

According to its current spec sheet, the headset sports a Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 + Gen 2, Sony-sourced micro‑OLED panels (no resolution specs yet), pancake lenses, automatic interpupillary distance (IPD) adjustment, and support for eye and hand-tracking. It’s also set to support VR motion controllers of some sort, although we haven’t seen them yet.

Make sure to check out our hands-on with Project Moohan from December 2024 to learn more, including notes on comfort, display clarity, and our experience with Android XR—which really looks a lot like Horizon OS combined with VisionOS.

Newsworks reports that Samsung is only expecting to ship “around 100,000 units” of the device this year—significantly less than Apple’s alleged 2024 targets for Vision Pro, which third-party analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reported last year ranged between 400–450k units. Granted, Samsung doesn’t have a lot of runway left until year’s end, so there’s no telling what it hopes to achieve with Moohan.

Still, industry sources expect Samsung’s XR headset to act as more of stepping stone to its wider smart glasses ambitions, Newsworks says.

Notably, Samsung has yet to announce its own smart glasses amidst a flurry of companies looking to enter the space, including Google’s Android XR smart glasses launching in partnership with America’s Warby Parker and South Korea’s Gentle Monster.

Following the recent launch of Oakley Meta HSTN, Meta is also reportedly expected to release a new pair of smart glasses, this time including a built-in display and wrist-worn controller, according to a recent report.

Chinese tech giant Xiaomi also recently launched its own smart glasses, which go toe-to-toe with Ray-Ban Meta, although appear to be exclusive to Mainland China.

Meanwhile, HTC unveiled its ‘VIVE Eagle’ smart glasses, which is shipping first in the company’s native Taiwan at NT$15,600 ($520 USD).

Samsung didn’t highlight its upcoming mixed reality headset at Unpacked last month, nor at Google I/O the month prior—but no fear, the South Korean tech giant confirmed its Android XR-based headset is still coming this year.

In a recent earnings call, Samsung says its upcoming XR headset, tentatively named ‘Project Moohan’, is still coming. Small recompense, considering we still don’t know its official name, when the device is launching, or at what price.

“Meanwhile, we are also preparing to introduce next-generation innovative products, including our XR headset and TriFold smartphone this year,” confirmed Daniel Araujo of the company’s ‘MX’ mobile division in the company’s Q2 2025 earnings call.

That said, Samsung has seemed pretty reticent to put Project Moohan in the spotlight, which has been less than reassuring. While press demos were available at Google I/O, the headset wasn’t heavily featured there, which seems like a missed opportunity to engage with Android developers—the very people who will be building apps for the upcoming Android XR operating system.

What’s more, Project Moohan was essentially also a no-show at Samsung Unpacked in July, it’s annual product event. Then again, so was its TriFold smartphone, which is also slated to arrive sometime this year, suggesting we might get another mini product event between now and the year’s end.

While we don’t know exactly when Project Moohan is launching, or at what price, here’s what we do know:

Project Moohan runs Android XR via a Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 + Gen 2. Its Sony-sourced micro‑OLED panels don’t have resolution specs yet, although it’s supposed to include some slimming pancake lenses, automatic interpupillary distance (IPD) adjustment, support for eye and hand-tracking, optional magnetically-attached light shield, and a removable external battery pack. The headset is also slated to support VR motion controllers of some sort, although we haven’t seen them yet.

To learn more, check out our hands-on with Project Moohan from December 2024, which includes everything from comfort, display clarity, and how Android XR looks a lot like Horizon OS combined with VisionOS.

Sharp announced it’s releasing a prototype VR haptic controller in Japan, which aims to reproduce the sense of touch in VR while serving a familiar button layout.

Japan-based Sharp says its VR haptic controllers can let users sense texture thanks to “multi-segmented tactile elements” placed on the device’s fingertips. Various vibration patterns on the surface are meant to convey different textures, such as smooth, rough, etc., the company says.

“Although the haptics are not at a level that reproduces the real thing, by changing the parameters we have been able to achieve a variety of tactile sensations,” Sharp says on the project’s Japan-facing website. “Rather than leaving it in-house until the developers are satisfied with it, we plan to work with our users to improve the quality of the content.”

Sharp says the device, which will arrive in a left and right pair, “does not allow for delicate finger tracking like glove types.” It also lacks force feedback, or any sort of temperature feedback.

The prototype is supposed to also function like a standard controller, including sticks and buttons, the company says. One thing that isn’t clear though is how the gloves will be tracked, which Sharp says could include mounts for “high market share” tracking standards.

Sharp says the device is currently undergoing demonstration experiments, so it’s not clear whether it will eventually be commercialized; we haven’t seen anything beyond renders at this time. The company is aiming to put early iterations of the device in the hands of the paying public though, at least in Japan.

The company recently closed pre-registrations through its Japan-facing website, pricing units at ¥100,000 (~$680). “Please note that development or release may be canceled,” the company warns.

Granted, Sharp has more experience in XR than you might think. As the leading OEM supplier of high-end VR displays, at one time Sharp was the top display supplier for Meta Quest 2. In late 2024, Sharp and Japan’s largest telecom NTT Docomo also launched a pair of AR glasses, called MiRZA.