Meta Hikes Quest VR Prices Following PS5 Bump as RAM Shortage Rocks Tech World

Meta announced it volition rise prices connected its Quest 3 and Quest 3S virtual world headsets by $50 to $100 starting April 19, citing rising constituent costs that person squeezed the user electronics industry. The Quest 3S volition leap to $349.99 for the 128GB exemplary and $449.99 for 256GB, portion the high-end Quest 3 with 512GB retention volition outgo $599.99.

"We're making this alteration due to the fact that the outgo of gathering high-performance VR hardware has risen significantly," Meta said successful its announcement. The institution specifically cited a "global surge successful the terms of captious components—specifically representation chips" that has impacted astir each user electronics category.

The terms increases widen to refurbished units arsenic well, with Quest 3S models rising $50 to $319.99 and $409.99 respectively, portion refurbished Quest 3 units spot a steeper $170 leap to $549.99.

Meta’s determination comes conscionable weeks aft Sony jacked up PlayStation 5, PS5 Pro, and PlayStation Portal prices, portion Microsoft raised prices connected its Xbox consoles aggregate times successful 2025. Tech hardware traditionally decreases successful terms implicit clip arsenic constituent costs autumn and manufacturers purpose to lure successful further customers with terms cuts.

That’s not been the lawsuit lately crossed galore antithetic types of user hardware, however. The RAM shortage driving Meta's terms hikes—driven successful portion by immense request for AI computing power—has besides forced increases crossed Samsung Galaxy phones and tablets, Lenovo's Legion Go 2, and different user devices.

Rising prices person consumers wondering which hardware mightiness beryllium the adjacent to spot a terms bump, fueling speculation that Nintendo’s Switch 2 could beryllium adjacent to tick up aft launching astatine $450 past year.