Imagine splurging $US3,500 on a new Apple Vision Pro headset only to discover a few weeks later that your very expensive device now has a crack on the front of the screen—one you’re sure isn’t your fault.
“I had seen Reddit posts the day before and thought people [were] just being dumb, like walking into walls or dropping it. As soon as I took the front protector off, I saw [the crack],” the Redditor u/ funnystone64, who mainly uses the device to watch Apple TV and YouTube videos in Safari, told Gizmodo. “I was baby-ing this thing and it still cracked.”
u/funnystone64 is one of at least a dozen Apple Vision Pro owners on the r/VisionPro subreddit and other online forums who have reported a random crack appearing on their devices, nearly always straight down the middle, despite their best efforts. Many claim they are “religious” about taking care of their devices, polishing them, and making sure the protective cover is always on. Others say they don’t even use the device heavily and noticed the crack after charging it overnight.
The Redditor u/inphenite, who owns their own business and travels frequently, has always been an early tech adopter. They said they had “gearlust” when the Apple Vision Pro came out. Although u/inphenite loves their experience with the device so far, they were incredibly frustrated when they woke up one day and found the headset with a big crack about three weeks after purchasing it.
“Def not heavy use, been using it 2-3 hours every other day at max. Noticed the crack one morning after taking it out of the Apple travel case. It was sitting there overnight, battery plugged in (but outside of the case),” u/inphenite said in messages to Gizmodo.
“Crackgate is real,” one Redditer proclaimed over the weekend. Useru/inphenite has a theory on what’s going on. They believe that it’s possible the Vision Pro has a software bug that causes it not to enter sleep mode, which leads it to run hot and expand the frame. This might cause a crack at the weak point of the front glass, u/inphenite said, although they clarified that they’re “just guessing.”
It’s unclear what’s causing the Apple Vision Pros to crack or whether this is a problem only affecting a very small subset of users. The company hasn’t released a statement on the matter and didn’t respond to Gizmodo’s requests for comment.
Apple also isn’t treating all Vision Pro owners the same in these cases. Some Reddit users said the company had agreed to repair their devices for free under warranty, while others have been told that they had to pay an AppleCare+ deductible to get the crack fixed. AppleCare+ for the Apple Vision Pro costs $US500 for two years, although repairs may cost users even more. Service fees for “other accidental damage” cost an additional $US299, according to Apple’s website.
Over on r/VisionPro, users continue to share their crackgate stories in the hope of bringing awareness to the potential issue and giving others leverage when asking for repairs. Two Vision Pro owners told Gizmodo that they would try to get refund if the device kept cracking even after it was repaired.
“If it’s cracking multiple times over and over, what’s the point? Who’s going to buy a car if it just rusts after you have it for a week? I don’t want that,” the Redditor u/BsSomers13, whose headset is currently back at Apple to repair the crack, told Gizmodo over the phone. “That’s a poor experience for the hefty price that you pay.”