Mark Zuckerberg's original metaverse vision is effectively over, after renaming Facebook to Meta and losing ~$80B on the endeavor, as Meta goes all in on AI

Five years ago, Mark Zuckerberg proclaimed that the future of Facebook would be the metaverse.

New York Times 2026-03-20

Context & Ripple Effects

Meta’s rebrand made the metaverse a company-defining, founder-led commitment; related coverage framed it as a bet on a future Zuckerberg could pursue through founder control. The reported end of that original vision therefore marks more than a product-priority change: it unwinds the strategic premise attached to the Meta name.

The shift had been underway before this account. In 2023 Zuckerberg argued AI and the metaverse could work together, but reporting in 2024 described AI taking priority over the metaverse, alongside job cuts and faster AI product releases.

First-order effects

Meta formally concentrates its strategic attention on AI, while the original metaverse program loses its role as the company’s organizing vision after roughly $80B in spending or losses.
Zuckerberg’s public rationale for renaming Facebook to Meta is weakened, turning the rebrand from a declaration of direction into evidence of a costly strategic reversal.

Second-order effects

Meta’s AI efforts gain greater internal urgency and resource competition, putting more pressure on rivals to differentiate their own AI positioning rather than rely on immersive-world narratives.
Companies and developers whose plans depended on Meta’s metaverse leadership lose a major source of validation and may need to treat AI, rather than virtual worlds, as the nearer-term platform priority.

Third-order effects

The episode underscores how large, founder-controlled platforms can absorb a long-horizon bet and then rapidly redirect it when a new computing priority emerges; Meta’s earlier rebrand as a founder-control bet makes that governance dynamic unusually visible.
If capital continues to move from immersive computing toward AI, the durable competitive divide will increasingly be shaped by who can sustain repeated, expensive strategic pivots—not simply who first articulates a platform vision.

The trend: Meta’s retreat is one data point in the broader reallocation of big-tech ambition and capital from virtual-world platforms toward AI-led products and infrastructure.

Discussion

@matvelloso Mat Velloso on x
People giving Meta a hard time about this but honestly? Meta Quest is a great product. Probably the most successful VR product on the market. VR is hard. Still, far more reasonable than Microsoft Teams spending hundreds of engineers to put avatars on the product so you could …
@jdunrrp @jdunrrp on x
Standing On Business 🚀😎 As @JoyReignVr and I have stated for a while now ... the mission continues! Let's Get'Em To The Metaverse!
@jordankutzer Jordan Kutzer on x
VR's narrative is being set by people who don't build in VR, don't spend time in VR, and don't see the small teams quietly winning. VR's best news happens in huge Discord servers, not on social or news articles. Jump into the culture for the good news.
@boztank Boz on x
Seems like this is pretty much an annual tradition now so putting this here so I can tap the sign later... [image]
@arian_ghashghai Arian Ghashghai on x
I'll go a step further: Horizon Worlds being shut down is the best news possible for consumer VR Meta's insistence to both own the platform (Quest + OS) and the first-party content (Horizon Worlds) created a palpable COI and routinely undercut third-party devs (i.e. the groups ma…
@jerseyh0mo Davey on x
I forgot about this stupid shit but imagine if they poured $80 billion into feeding the hungry instead of this failed cartoon universe that nobody wanted
@girldrawsghosts @girldrawsghosts on x
It's so funny that i have literally never seen another image of the metaverse. Like it came out, right? Did metaverse even happen? I have not seen a single person ever tweet about it
@kevinroose Kevin Roose on x
“The Metaverse” was a 5-year experiment conducted by Harvard University for the purpose of transferring wealth from Meta shareholders to employees who pretended it was fun to go to meetings in a VR headset. We thank you for your participation.
@xuwu Wu Xu on x
Every so often, another clickbait headline shows up trying to dunk on XR. It is tiring. Let's just stick to the facts. Horizon Worlds VR probably cost around $2 billion at most. Start from the top. Reality Labs had around 14,000 people before. After the layoffs in January, …
@vasuman Vas on x
As someone who worked at Reality Labs: the Metaverse had real legs but was obliterated by middle management completely out of touch with how young people actually use technology. I built a V1 tool that game developers genuinely needed, and the moment it was done, it got shipped …
@jmdagdelen John Dagdelen on x
Need to check Kevin here. Meta is not shutting down their metaverse project. Horizon worlds is just getting focused on mobile and desktop, like Roblox. Moreover, they are continuing their VR work and they plan to keep investing more in the coming years. All they are doing is …
@matthew_d_green Matthew Green on x
Shutting down the Metaverse is like admitting your AI can't do amazing things. If you have infinite software development capability, just have your AI build an amazing metaverse.
@matthew_d_green Matthew Green on x
Think how cool the Metaverse could have been if Meta AI worked.
@wallstmemes @wallstmemes on x
If you're having a bad day, remember that someone paid $450,000 to live next to Snoop Dog in the metaverse
@joeperticone Joe Perticone on x
Wonder what they're up to [Feb. 2022 Fortune headline “Someone just paid $450,000 to be Snoop Dogg's neighbor in the metaverse. Here's how you can live by a celebrity too"]
@paultassi Paul Tassi on x
Imagine renaming your company something you now have to routinely admit is an utter failure every few months with layoffs and shutdowns
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
i guess the idea just didn't have legs
@anisha_moonka Anish Moonka on x
Mark Zuckerberg sold 7 million AI glasses last year while everyone was laughing at his metaverse. The $80 billion number in this tweet is slightly off. Reality Labs has posted $84 billion in total losses since 2020, per Meta's Q4 2025 earnings. But here's what the dunks leave
@wdavidmarx W. David Marx on x
I know that vaporware / pivoting is core to Silicon Valley but how many more data points do we need to remember Zuck fundamentally as a serial bullshitter whose grand announcements and launches never ever amounted to anything? He acquired/copied all of his successes after FB.
@willsolfiac Will Solfiac on x
I'd love to read a good explanation of how on earth Facebook and Zuckerberg thought that going all in on the ‘metaverse’ was ever a sound business decision. Did he develop a cocaine habit or something? Can it really be that the guy who was so smart with facebook, instagram and
@abhijitwt Abhijit on x
> be Zuckerberg. > rename Facebook to Meta in 2021. > declare the metaverse is the future. > pour $80B+ into Reality Labs. > build Horizon Worlds. > legless avatars, empty lobbies, low retention. > insist this is the next internet. > 2024-2025. > losses pile up. > investors get […
@malonebarry Barry Malone on x
In honour of the closure of the metaverse, I would like to re-up one of the worst videos ever recorded.
@canteverdie @canteverdie on x
mark zuckerberg should get the olympic gold medal of burning money away
@ethanz Ethan Zuckerman on bluesky
Re: Meta's retreat from the metaverse: www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/t... Told you so: — www.theatlantic.com/technology/ a...
@tommysalty @tommysalty on bluesky
Ok, so another widely hyped pipe dream that was rightly mocked is over, a lot of resources wasted on something that no one wanted or needed. — And I guess they want to focus on another thing that's almost exactly that. [embedded post]
@tabletopminions @tabletopminions on bluesky
So he wasted $80B on cartoon avatars that nobody liked, and now he'll probably waste even more on AI - which will largely be most useless. And yet... some people seem to listen to him? [embedded post]
@deanwampler.com Dean Wampler on bluesky
I would have taken a fraction of the $80B Zuckerberg spent on this effort to tell him years ago that it was doomed from the beginning, but he didn't ask... [embedded post]
@maeve @maeve on bluesky
“capitalism is the most efficient system btw” [embedded post]
@shadowmanos Manos Nikolaidis on bluesky
When you have a product that most people hate, but are stuck with it for various reasons, so it prints money for you to waste. [embedded post]
@edzitron.com Ed Zitron on bluesky
i was actively mocked in 2021 when I said the metaverse was bullshit, and in 2023 when i said the metaverse is dead. This should've been a wake-up moment for the tech media that they were being had, but nothing has changed as a result — www.businessinsider.com/metaverse- de...…
@daniloc.xyz @daniloc.xyz on bluesky
makes ya wonder how that AI thing is gonna turn out for him [embedded post]
@kashhill @kashhill on bluesky
In 2022, I did a story about life in “the metaverse,” spending 24 hours as an avatar with no legs meeting the people using Facebook's VR-based social network, Horizon Worlds. www.nytimes.com/2022/10/07/t... Met interesting people who seemed enthused about it but this was my conc…
@paulthedogman Paul Barrett on bluesky
Zuckerberg would be ousted as CEO if he did not control the board of directors and have controlling stock. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/t...
r/EatTheRich r on reddit
RIP Metaverse, an $80 Billion Dumpster Fire Nobody Wanted
r/technology r on reddit
RIP Metaverse, an $80 Billion Dumpster Fire Nobody Wanted | Who could have possibly predicted this, besides everyone?

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