Headspace, which has built a growing digital health business around mindfulness, is joining forces with Meta to launch a meditation app for Quest, the social media giant’s virtual reality headset.
Called Headspace XR, the newly launched VR app — developed with funding from Meta — guides users through meditation and other activities, like a Tai Chi-inspired movement game, meant to encourage mental wellbeing. Headspace leaders said the app, an attempt to engage with younger people that currently use its services, will help the company study the potential for virtual reality to improve mental health.
“Success is reading a headline that says ‘Gen Z’s flooding Headspace XR and feeling less alone,’” Sara Cohen, Headspace’s vice president of content creation told STAT. “That the generation of people that we’ve designed this for are truly feeling the positive benefits.”