KEY FINDINGS
• The glass panel is glued on, of course, and it took a lot of heat and time, but we removed it without breakage. Granted, it didn’t come out unscathed—the glass has a protective plastic film that got a little peeled up and maybe a bit melted. Apple’s retail fixers might have faster hands than us, but they’ll charge you $799 to replace broken front glass.
• The speakers are fixed onto the two rigid bands that join to the main headset. To release these, use the SIM card removal tool. The holes are inside the temples of the main headset, and the removable bands have a row of electrical contacts, like Lighting connectors. This gives us hope that opening the headset may not be as daunting as we assumed.
• The battery pack alone weighs 353 grams and is made of three iPhone-sized batteries, delivering a grand total of 35.9 Wh—more than double an iPhone 15 Pro’s 17.3 Wh. The cells themselves are 184g apiece, surprisingly only about half the weight of the full battery pack. To get inside, we had to soften some perimeter adhesive and release a set of single-use metal clips, then twist open Torx screws galore.
• Every face is different, and Apple is selling 28 light-seal parts to cover all the different face sizes and shapes. The seals attach to the main headset using magnets, which is Apple through and through—it’s either glued in place, or extremely easy to swap. This modularity is a brute force attempt to get an ideal fit on your face. It will be interesting to see if this is required long term, or if future devices find a simpler way to accomplish this.
• Under the magnetic seals is a permanent seal, also wrapped in a knit fabric, but less likely to get smudged. It also happens to be the way into the interior of the headset. Removing it reveals another surprise: a thin, stretchy sheet of plastic. Whether it’s to compensate for gaps in the knit, or keep particulates out of the innner workings, we’re not sure. But we are certain this bit looks very ‘masked superhero’.
• The Vision Pro has a lenticular layer on top of the exterior OLED panel. VisionOS renders multiple face images—call them A and B—slices them up, and displays A from one angle serving your left eye, and B from another serving your right eye. This creates a 3D face via the stereoscopic effect.
• Repairability Score: 4 out of 10 (10 is easiest to repair). On one hand, there’s a lot to like. The battery is modular, as are the side straps with integrated speakers. We also like the easy-to-fit lens inserts and magnetically attached light shields. On the other, getting to the front cameras and sensors is tricky. The glass cover needs a lot of finessing, and cracking it might render the sensors useless.