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Meta Quest Update Brings 'Flight Mode' With Train Support to Follow

Bring your Quest 2 or 3 on your next flight and you'll find a whole new experience waiting for you.

Russell Holly
Russell Holly is a Managing Editor on the Commerce team at CNET. He works with all of CNET to assemble top recommendations as well as helping everyone find the best way to buy anything at the best price. When not writing for CNET you can find him riding a bike, running around in Jedi robes, or contributing to WOSU public radio's Tech Tuesday segment.
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Russell Holly
2 min read
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CNET

Meta has been hard at work updating its Quest lineup, which is already the market powerhouse, to better compete with Apple's Vision Pro headset. Today's update adds what Meta is calling Flight Mode, an option which allows you to use your VR headset on an airplane without losing functionality.

Prior to the Flight Mode update, if you attempted to use a Meta Quest 3 on an airplane you'd find the experience somewhat lacking. If you wanted apps to stay put while the plane was in motion you had to turn off positional tracking, which meant you couldn't use your hands for much of anything. With this new update, you can turn on Flight Mode in Experimental settings or pin it to your Quick Settings bar in order to access it with a simple gesture. This experience allows you to use your hands or your controllers while the plane is in flight, similar to the experience previously only available on Apple Vision Pro. Not included in this experience is functionality on a train or other form of mass transit, which Meta has explained will e coming in future updates. 

Meta has also announced a partnership with Lufthansa to include a custom suite of apps available to anyone in an Allegris Business Class Suite. It's not immediately clear what apps will be available exclusively to these high end Lufthansa customers, just that a Meta Quest 3 will be available as part of their flight experience. Meta suggested in its blog post to expect other airline partnerships in the future. 

To confirm you have this update, head to the Software Update section of Settings in your Meta Quest 2 or 3 and download the v65 update.