Valve’s long-rumored VR headset is finally real: the Valve Index, coming in May

Enlarge / What do we know about Valve's new VR headset? Not much, beyond this image. (credit: Valve)

Valve Corporation's long-rumored VR headset is finally real. After allying with HTC to launch the Vive as a SteamVR product in 2016, Valve has moved ahead with plans to launch its own headset, the Valve Index, in "May 2019."

The news came on Friday in the form of a single teaser image, shown above, of a headset with the phrase "Valve Index" written on its front. The front of the headset is flanked by at least two sensors. This shadow-covered hardware matches the leaked headset reported by UploadVR in November of last year. That report hinted to Valve's headset supporting a wider, 135-degree field-of-view (FOV), as opposed to the roughly 110-degree FOV of the original HTC Vive and Oculus Rift.

Valve's dedicated website for the new device includes no other information than the above image and the date "May 2019." It does not include any mention of the new SteamVR Knuckles controllers, which Valve has advertised pretty heavily via developer outreach since their 2016 reveal and a later series of improved prototypes in 2018. This page also doesn't mention a series of three Valve-produced VR games that have been repeatedly advertised by Valve co-founder Gabe Newell since 2017.

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