TikTok’s Parent Company Might Be Working on ‘Mixed-Reality’ Goggles

ByteDance,, TikTok's parent company, is reportedly working on mixed reality goggles that could potentially go toe-to-toe with Meta in the virtual/augmented reality wearable space. The team behind the company's Pico 4 VR headset is reportedly developing a smaller, lighter wearable for mixed reality. It's said to be similar in its feature set to Meta's upcoming AR smart glasses.

ByteDance's goggles are rumored to be about the size of BigScreen Beyond's VR goggles, which weigh about 100 grams. Like Meta's Orion prototype, the computational heavy-lifting will be mainly done in a separate puck. Unlike the Orion, the extra device will attach to the goggles via a wire.

There’s no word yet on whether the device will be released under the Pico brand, or even when it will launch. But a trickier question could be where it will be sold—a release in China seems certain, but given the contentious relationship between the U.S. government and TikTok, it's hard to imagine it will be a smooth process for ByteDance to release hardware in the U.S. any time soon.

ByteDance has reportedly agreed to divest its U.S. TikTok operations, as mandated by federal law to avoid a nationwide ban, and is also said to be working on an America-specific version of the TikTok app. Maybe, once the dust settles and everything cools down, we’ll see ByteDance-branded XR headsets on U.S. shelves next to those from Metas.

Meanwhile, for a deeper dive into Meta's plans, I've rounded up the rumors swirling around Zuckerberg's next VR/AR devices.