Despite being perhaps the name most associated with VR gaming, Facebook is retiring the Oculus branding. Alongside Facebook's plans to rename itself Meta, it has announced plans to rename the Oculus line of VR products to align them with the new name for the overall company.
The news was shared in a post by Facebook CTO Andrew Bosworth, who said the shift will begin in early 2022. Oculus Quest will become Meta Quest, while the Oculus App will be renamed the Meta Quest App.
"VR will be the most immersive way for people to access the metaverse and as we look toward our goal of bringing 1B people into VR, we want to make it clear that Quest is a Meta product," he wrote. "For this reason, we're simplifying our brand architecture and shifting away from the Oculus brand."
Bosworth described this as a "very difficult decision to make" given the "strong attachment" to the Oculus brand. "While we're retiring the name, I can assure you that the original Oculus vision remains deeply embedded in how Meta will continue to drive mass adoption for VR today," he said. "We'll also expand Meta Horizon as the brand that will encompass all of our first-party immersive social experiences. You've seen this already with Horizon Workrooms and Horizon Worlds. Soon you'll see us shift from Oculus to Horizon Home, Hori."
The news will come as a puzzling decision to some given the brand recognition of Oculus (not to mention that people will likely continue using the Oculus Quest name regardless). But Facebook/Meta is attempting to make a major pivot to refocus its efforts on establishing a metaverse, however maligned or ill-fated some may believe that concept to be. Dropping the Oculus branding is just one part of a wider initiative to embrace the new Meta name.
Alongside this, there was some welcome news for Oculus owners. Last year, Facebook made the controversial decision to eventually require a Facebook account for all Oculus device users, including all new adopters as of October 2020. Existing owners would be given a grace period until January 2023, when support would end for Oculus accounts and "full functionality" would no longer be available without logging in with your Facebook account.
Bosworth revealed in the same post that the negative feedback has been heard, saying, "We're working on new ways to log into Quest that won't require a Facebook account, landing sometime next year. This is one of our highest priority areas of work internally." Further details weren't shared, but it's an encouraging development nonetheless.
Facebook purchased Oculus back in March 2014, and in the years since, Facebook's name has come to be used for various aspects of the company: Last year, the Oculus Connect became Facebook Connect, while the AR/VR team was named Facebook Reality Labs. Oculus Quest itself was officially known as Oculus Quest From Facebook prior to the shift to the new Meta Quest name.