Meta Platforms has two headset prototypes that caused a stir at SIGGRAPH 2025 last week in Vancouver. Boba 3 features an ultrawide 180- degree horizontal by 120-degree vertical field of view, with 4K LCDs achieving 30 pixels per degree (PPD). Human vision is approximately 200×135 degrees, while the Quest 3 offers less than 110×96. The other device, Tiramisu, touts 90 PPD — 3.6x the pixel density of the Meta Quest 3 — and aims for “a new milestone for realism in VR.” The prototypes are the latest steps on Meta Reality Labs’ “mission to pass the visual Turing test” by creating “virtual experiences that are indistinguishable from the physical world.”

In a technical paper the company suggests these two prototypes presented at SIGGRAPH mark “an achievement that may be closer than you think.”

“Meta says Boba 3 covers roughly 90 percent of human field of view, compared to 46 percent for Quest 3,” reports UploadVR, which got hands-on time with the device at the annual conference.

“What I saw was an image roughly as clear and sharp as Quest 3 but across a truly massive field of view, both horizontal and vertical,” the UploadVR writer explains. “It engulfed the majority of my vision, with only a small chunk on the extreme horizontal periphery, and vertically below me, missing.”

Impressively, unlike other ultrawide field of view VR efforts, “Boba 3 has only minor distortion at the very edges, comparable to what you see on the edges of Quest 3,” reports UploadVR.

Forbes shares insight into Tiramisu, which in addition to more pixel density has “16x the brightness (1,400 nits) and three times the contrast” of the Quest 3. Detailing “Micro OLED panels and glass lenses, rather than the usual plastic, to maximize optical sharpness,” it offers pixel density “far in excess” of even the Apple Vision Pro with 34 PPD.

While the technology suggests breakthroughs, “there are major compromises,” according to Forbes, which says Tiramisu’s field of view is currently “just 33 degrees by 33 degrees, compared to 110 horizontal by 96 degrees vertical in the Quest 3.”

What Meta eventually winds up incorporating into a potential Quest 4 commercial headset is yet to be seen. “But a combination of the visual fidelity of Tiramisu and the immersive field of view of Boba 3 gives VR fans plenty to daydream about,” muses Forbes.

“At Meta, data wins arguments, and for Reality Labs Research, and within dynamic super-resolution (DSR) in particular, that ethos is summed up by the words “demo or die,” the Meta paper proclaims, adding that while Tiramisu and Boba 3 “are purely research prototypes, with novel technologies that may never make their way into a consumer product, they’re important steps on the road to the next computing platform.”