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Oculus Rift Gets a Price Tag: $599

Oculus’s price for its first consumer virtual-reality headset may influence how others price theirs.
January 6, 2016

Facebook-owned Oculus announced Wednesday that it’s selling its first consumer virtual-reality headset, Rift, for $599. For some buyers the price tag will be just a portion of the overall price, though, as you may need to shell out for a powerful PC to which it will be tethered.

The virtual-reality market is still small, but it’s growing quickly with companies like Oculus and HTC releasing powerful consumer headsets in the coming months. As the first of these slated to hit the market this year, the Rift’s price could help influence how other companies will sell theirs.

Oculus started letting people preorder the device through its website on Wednesday as well; it won’t start shipping to buyers until March 28. Oculus also said it will sell Rift through some retailers in April.

Starting in February, Oculus will let people preorder a Rift headset along with a PC that will work with it; these will start at $1,499.

The Rift comes with an Xbox One wireless controller, as well as a remote control and a game called Lucky’s Tale (those who preorder it get an additional game as well). Oculus said its Oculus Studios will roll out over 20 games for the device this year, including a version of the music game Rock Band.

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