The closure of Horizon Worlds in VR version is more than just a virtual project scrapped. The title was indeed the flagship video game that Mark Zuckerberg believed would populate his Metaverse, a digital universe on which Menlo Park has heavily bet: billions and rebranding (the name Meta). In its VR form, it was also supposed to theoretically boost sales of the Meta Quest, the headset to be worn on the eyes that, like the metaverse, crashed against the indifference of the general public.
IS META CLOSING THE METAVERSE?
The Horizon Worlds version for Meta Quest will be removed from the store in the coming hours. Specifically, according to Meta itself, from March 21, 2026: those who download it by March 31 will be able to use it only until June 15, 2026, after which Menlo Park will permanently shut down the VR servers.
The decision, fatal especially for Zuckerberg who had persevered in the project until the last despite numerous warnings that it was a failing venture (even the Italian mainstream press, not particularly up to date when it comes to video games and hi-tech topics, had sensed the downward spiral as early as November 2021, with Repubblica headlining: “What if the metaverse was a colossal flop?”), most likely responds to precise saving needs.
So far, the US CEO and founder has been able to toy around in his “sad and deserted” (quote from another article of the Roman daily founded by Eugenio Scalfari) virtual amusement park because Facebook’s financial data since the pandemic have never stopped swelling. Not thanks to the metaverse: all credit goes to advertising revenues from social media. But now Zuckerberg has promised US President Donald Trump to invest $600 billion in data centers and AI, a game in which Meta is still chasing rivals, so it seems the times of waste are truly over.
HOW MANY BILLIONS HAS THE METAVERSE BURNED?
Last December, rumors spread that Menlo Park had decided to cut the budget by up to 30% dedicated to the quintessential non-place. In January, according to sources cited by the New York Times, the company cut about 10% of the division’s staff, equal to 1,500 people since the team globally counts 15,000 members.
Detractors of Meta’s metaverse have enjoyed keeping track of the billions Mark Zuckerberg stubbornly invested in the project he recently carried forward alone, as all other major companies that had made announcements in this regard had quietly withdrawn one by one.
The challenge was also taken up by Start Magazine: over these years during which we repeatedly said it was an unparalleled colossal flop, we had counted $45 billion down the drain, then the calculator started to give crazy numbers. It would be much more: the Financial Times notes that the Reality Labs division alone, the team responsible for the project, lost over $70 billion in less than five years. But if you also add the commercial flop of the headsets, the final figure could be much higher. In short, Meta’s metaverse is a dream left halfway.
