The Apple Vision Pro may get special 3D versions of movies through the TV app

If you watched Apple’s unveiling of the Vision Pro during WWDC of 2023, then you know that the Cupertino company’s first mixed-reality headset is aiming to be something different than what the best AR/VR headsets are.

Right now, AR has taken a back seat — in some sort of bus and it is the very last seat indeed — while VR is basically driving. And it’s driving across these beautiful meadows with breathtaking views, because as of 2023, XR headsets are media consumption devices.

The Vision Pro? Not so much. I mean, sure, it’s going to be able to do that, but “media” is not the main point. And with Netflix recently saying that it won’t make a custom app for visionOS, people may be wondering if the Vision Pro is even capable of entertainment.

Oh, it is. In 3D too!


Some of you may know that developers have had access to a beta of visionOS, which is what the Vision Pro will be running on. But here’s why beta participation is exciting: you get frequent updates.

A new one, which participating devs managed to uncover in the code, was a “Play 3D” button within the new TV app. The existence of this isn’t anything new, as Apple boasted about this — and its numerous partnerships with the likes of Disney — during the reveal of the headset.

Said button is also seemingly exclusively destined for the Vision Pro. Right now, you can basically reach an almost identical screen like the one from the tweet above, but the button will only say “Play” in the iPhone and Mac versions of the TV app.

So, this may work in a way familiar to some fans: Apple silently upgrading applicable movies to 3D on the backend and that working only with specific hardware. Will that be the case? We don’t know.

Now, that’s the other exciting thing about beta programs — nothing is final until the product is actually released. And the Vision Pro still has quite a way to go, so be patient. We’ll make sure to tell you all about cool details like this in the meantime.