Meta Quest 3S

VR experiences for Quest 3S

You have the headset. Here is somewhere to point it: real places filmed in 16K VR180, playing straight in the Quest browser with nothing to install.

Opening the browser is the whole setup

Most of what a new headset offers arrives through a store, a download and a wait. This does not. Explore POV plays in the Meta Quest Browser through WebXR, so there is nothing to install, nothing to keep updated and nothing sitting on your storage.

  1. Open the Meta Quest Browser. It is preinstalled on every Quest, including the 3S.
  2. Type explorepov.com. Or go straight to explorepov.com/vr if you want the shortcut.
  3. Press play on the trailer. It runs with no account needed, so you can judge the picture before you decide anything.
  4. Look around. No controller aiming, no teleporting. Turn your head and the place turns with you, with the sound that was recorded on location.

186 of our 187 experiences play in a headset browser today, across 23 countries. Everything is filmed by us on location, in 16K VR180, in stereo.

Six to watch first

If you have had the headset for a day and want to know whether filmed VR is worth your evening, go in this order. The first one needs no account at all.

After that, the shortest way to find your own taste is by mood: relaxing if you want to wind down, mountains or scenic journeys if you want to move, quick escapes if you have three minutes before dinner.

Getting the best picture out of a 3S

The 3S is the same library and the same player as a Quest 3, but it is not the same optics, and a couple of minutes of fiddling makes a visible difference.

The 3S uses Fresnel lenses rather than the pancake lenses in the Quest 3, which means a smaller sharp region in the centre of the view and a softer edge beyond it. It also runs a lower resolution display and a slightly narrower field of view than its more expensive sibling. None of that stops filmed VR180 looking good, but it does mean fit is doing more work for you than it would on a Quest 3.

Browser or a store app, honestly

We run in the browser, so we would say the browser is good. Here is the fair version, including the parts where an installed app wins.

Where the browser wins

  • Nothing to install, nothing to update, no storage used
  • You can try it in about forty seconds, before deciding anything
  • The same link works on Quest, Pico and Samsung Galaxy XR
  • New experiences appear without a download

Where an installed app wins

  • Offline playback, which a browser stream cannot do
  • Heavier real-time 3D and games, which need the GPU directly
  • Hand and controller interaction beyond looking around
  • Launching from your headset library rather than a bookmark
Our own limitation

We do not ship a Quest store app, so there is no offline download on Quest today. If you want to watch on a plane, that is a genuine reason to pick something else. On Apple Vision Pro we do have a native app, and offline downloads work there.

Questions we get asked

Do I need to install an app on my Quest 3S?

No. Explore POV runs in the Meta Quest Browser using WebXR. Open the browser, go to explorepov.com, pick something and press play. Nothing is downloaded, nothing takes up storage, and there is no store listing to find first.

Does the Quest 3S play the same experiences as a Quest 3?

Yes, the same library and the same player. The difference is the optics rather than the catalogue: Quest 3S uses Fresnel lenses with a smaller central sweet spot, where Quest 3 uses pancake lenses and a higher resolution display. The footage is identical, so getting the headset positioned well matters more on a 3S.

What resolution actually reaches the headset?

We film in 16K VR180 and encode a ladder of streaming tiers on top of that, up to 8K in the browser. The player picks a tier from your connection and you can push it higher by hand in the quality menu. No headset on sale today displays the full 16K master, but starting there is why the tiers hold up.

Can I watch something without making an account?

Yes. Our trailer plays with no account at all, which is the sensible way to find out whether you like the format before you decide anything. An account plus a subscription unlocks the whole library on every supported device you sign in on. See pricing.

The picture looks soft. What is wrong?

Usually one of three things. The headset is sitting too low or too high, so you are looking through the edge of the lens rather than the centre. Your connection dropped and the player stepped down a tier, which you can override in the quality menu. Or the lenses have fogged, which happens if the headset went on straight after coming in from the cold.

What else runs in the Quest browser besides you?

Plenty. There are large libraries of 180 and 360 video on the big video platforms, plenty of WebXR experiments, and store apps that do things a browser cannot, including offline playback and heavier real-time 3D. We think we are the best filmed travel library you can open without installing anything, and we would rather you tried the trailer than took our word for it. Our roundup of VR travel apps names the alternatives.