Product Code Database
HTC Vive is a line of Virtual reality and mixed reality headsets produced by HTC. The brand currently encompasses headsets designed for use with personal computers as well as standalone headsets such as the Vive Focus line, Vive Flow glasses, and the Vive Elite XR mixed reality headset.
The first-generation Vive was announced in 2015, as part of a collaboration with video game studio and distributor Valve Corporation, and implementing its VR software and hardware platform SteamVR; the first-generation consumer model was released in April 2016. It has since been succeeded by newer models with upgraded specifications. HTC has also released accessories that integrate with the Vive and SteamVR, including sensors for motion capture and facial capture.
Since 2021, HTC has targeted the Vive line towards the business and enterprise markets, moving away from the consumer market.
During his Immersed 2015 keynote, Chief Content Officer for HTC Phil Chen explained that he "stumbled upon VR" and later, HTC met Valve, which turned out to be "serendipity". Chen also explained that HTC and Valve don't have a clear dividing line between each of their responsibilities, and HTC is very much a partner in the research and development process.
In June 2016, HTC announced the release of their 'Business Edition' of the Vive for US$1,200 which would include a Professional Use License, a 12-month Commercial Warranty, access to an exclusive support line, a 5-meter (16 ft) cable extension kit, and it included the Deluxe Audio Strap.
HTC announced an updated revision of the Vive known as the Vive Pro in January 2018, which featured a higher resolution display and other design tweaks for comfort. In 2019, HTC released the Vive Cosmos, which features inside-out motion tracking without external base stations, and also supports interchangeable faceplates with different functionality.
The first-generation HTC Vive headset contains two OLED display panels with a resolution of 1080×1200 per-eye, with a refresh rate of 90 Hertz and a 110 degree field of view. It contains a G-Sensor, gyroscope and Proximity sensor sensor, and a front-facing camera used for the "Chaperone" feature, which can display the boundaries of the user's chosen perimeter or the view of the camera in order to help guide the user away from objects and walls in their play area.
The headset must be connected to a supported PC using a "link box", which contains USB 3.0, HDMI, and power connectors. The Vive initially required computers running Microsoft Windows. In February 2017, support was added for Linux, followed by support for macOS in June 2017. However, SteamVR support for macOS was discontinued by Valve in 2020, with the company stating that it planned to focus solely on Linux and Windows moving forward.
The Vive Cosmos ships with a different controller due to its Pose tracking; unlike the "wand" controllers, they are nearly identical in design to the Oculus Touch controllers, with each controller having two face buttons, an analog stick, a trigger and bumper, and a grip button.
In 2022, HTC unveiled a platform known as Viverse, which is designed to integrate first and third-party metaverse, VR, collaboration, and Web3 platforms.
The Vive Pro was sold alongside the original HTC Vive as a high-end model; initially, the headset was sold standalone without base stations or controllers, as it was intended as a drop-in replacement for the original Vive. HTC later released bundles of the Vive Pro with base stations and controllers, with the "Starter Kit" including the original controllers and base stations, and the "Full Kit" featuring updated SteamVR 2.0 base stations and controllers, which have improved performance and tracking volume (supporting spaces of up to 10 square metres in size) but are not backwards compatible with the original HTC Vive headset and controllers.
In January 2019 at CES, HTC unveiled the Vive Pro Eye, which adds built-in eye tracking. On 11 May 2021, HTC unveiled the Vive Pro 2, which upgrades its screens to 2448×2448 resolution per-eye (marketed as 5K resolution), with a 120-degree field of view, 120 Hz refresh rate, and Display Stream Compression support. HTC promoted that the displays had "minimal motion blur" and that they had "virtually eliminated" the screen-door effect. It carries backwards compatibility with all existing HTC Vive and SteamVR-compatible accessories and controllers. As with the original Pro, it was initially released as a standalone headset only. The Full Kit version of the Vive Pro 2 began shipping in October 2021.
The first-generation Vive Focus used a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 system-on-chip, with input provided via either a small, remote-like controller, or motion controllers using three degrees of freedom. It was initially released exclusively in China, and launched internationally in November 2018. In February 2019, HTC announced the Vive Focus Plus, a hardware refresh with updated motion controllers that support six degrees of freedom, and design tweaks for improved weight distribution.
A direct successor known as the Vive Focus 3 was unveiled in May 2021. It uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 system-on-chip, has a per-eye resolution of 2448×2448 at 90 Hz, a 120-degree field of view, and improved comfort. It supports Vive Business Streaming for playing VR content from a computer. In September 2024, HTC unveiled the Vive Focus Vision, an updated version of the Focus 3 with an improved strap and cooling system, 12 GB of RAM, 16 megapixel color passthrough cameras, foveated rendering support, and DisplayPort over USB-C (with an update for wired PC tethering at up to 120 Hz scheduled to be released by the end of the year). It is backward compatible with accessories designed for the Focus 3.
Similarly to the Oculus Quest and Rift S, it uses "inside-out" tracking, whereby the controllers are tracked using six cameras in the front faceplate of the headset rather than external base stations. Due to its use of inside-out tracking, the Vive Cosmos does not use the wand controllers used by other Vive models, and ships with a different controller that is nearly identical in design and functionality to the second-generation Oculus Touch controllers.
The Cosmos features a 90 Hz LCD display, with a 110-degree field of view and overall resolution of 2880×1700. It supports interchangeable faceplates to change its functionality, such as an External Tracking faceplate (which supports tracking with SteamVR base stations). The faceplate can also be lifted up like a visor, allowing the user to see the outside world without fully taking off the headset.
It uses a software platform known as Vive Reality System rather than SteamVR, with the "Lens" user interface and integration with HTC's Viveport platform. In February 2020, HTC announced three new Vive Cosmos SKUs, including the Cosmos Elite (a full kit with the External Tracking faceplate, controllers, and base stations), Cosmos XR (which ships with a faceplate containing "high-quality XR passthrough cameras", designed for enhanced mixed reality experiences), and Cosmos Play (an entry-level model with only four cameras on the faceplate).
SteamVR was launched with native support for Unity on its platform.
On 30 April 2015, Epic Games announced support for Valve's SteamVR technology, allowing developers to create VR projects with Unreal Engine 4 for the HTC Vive. Epic said that SteamVR is completely integrated into Unreal Engine 4 across Blueprint visual scripting and native code, meaning projects can be built without being dependent on programmer support if needed. Epic's own Showdown tech demo can already be experienced on SteamVR using the Vive headset.
In July 2016, VR news website Road to VR used game session figures from the Steam VR platform to estimate that approximately 100,000 Vive headsets had been shipped since launch. In the same month, SensoMotoric Instruments (SMI), a computer vision company, integrated its eye tracking technology in the HTC Vive to turn it into a dedicated eye tracking solution for research and professional applications. In November 2016, Vive announced that it would begin the first retail sales of its headsets at JB Hi-Fi and Harvey Norman stores in Australia later that month.
On 23 November 2016, HTC announced that the Vive was sold at a profit and that HTC Vive sales were "much higher" than 140,000.
Since the launch of Vive, HTC has increasingly targeted its products towards the business market rather than prosumer and gaming markets, with the Vive Focus 3 in particular having been developed with input from its enterprise customers. Vive General Manager Dan O'Brien stated that "the consumer market has gravitated toward these artificially subsidized price points that really only one company in the world has any tolerance for" (alluding to Facebook Inc.), and that "the enterprise and professional market is a very healthy and rapidly growing market where we can bring real value and solutions." The Vive Focus Vision in 2024 would partially backpedal on this trend, with HTC marketing its changes as appealing to a gaming market.
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