Summary After updating to visionOS 26, we’ve encountered severe transparency rendering issues in RealityKit that did not exist in visionOS 2.6 and earlier. These regressions affect applications that dynamically control scene opacity (via OpacityComponent). Our app renders ultra-realistic apartment environments in real time, where users can walk or teleport inside 3D spaces. When the user moves above a speed threshold, we apply a global transparency effect to prevent physical collisions with real-world objects. Everything worked perfectly in visionOS 2.6 — the problems appeared only after upgrading to 26. Scene Setup Overview The environment consists of multiple USDZ models (e.g., architecture, rooms, furniture). We manage LODs manually for performance (e.g., walls and floors always visible in full-res, while rooms swap between low/high-res versions based on user position and field of view). Transparency is achieved using OpacityComponent, applied dynamically when the user moves. Some meshes (e.g., portals to skyboxes, glass windows) use alpha materials We also use OcclusionMaterials to prevent things to be seen through walls when scene is transparent Observed Behavior by Scenario (I can share a video showing the results of each scenario if needed.) Scenario 1 — Severe Flickering (Root Opacity) Setup: OpacityComponent applied to the root entity NO ModelSortGroupComponent used Symptoms: Strong flickering when transparency is active Triangles within the same mesh render at inconsistent opacity levels Appears as if per-triangle alpha sorting is broken Workaround: Moving the OpacityComponent from the root to each individual USDZ entity removes the per-triangle flicker Pros: No conflicts with portals or alpha materials Scenario 2 — Partially Stable, But Alpha Conflicts Setup: OpacityComponent applied per USDZ entity ModelSortGroupComponent(planarUIAlwaysBehind) applied to portal meshes Other entities have NO ModelSortGroupComponent Symptoms: Frequent alpha blending conflicts: Transparent surfaces behind other transparent surfaces flicker or disappear Example: Wine glasses behind glass doors — sometimes neither is rendered, or only one Even opaque meshes behind glass flicker due to depth buffer confusion Alpha materials sometimes render portals or the real world behind them, ignoring other geometry entirely Analysis: Appears related to internal changes in alpha sorting or depth pre-pass behavior introduced in visionOS 26 Pros: Most stable setup so far Cons: Still unreliable when OpacityComponent is active Scenario 3 — Layer Separation Attempt (Regression) Setup: Same as Scenario 2, but: Entities with alpha materials moved to separate USDZs Explicit ModelSortGroupComponent order set (alpha surfaces rendered last) Symptoms: Transparent surfaces behind other transparent surfaces flicker or disappear Depth is completely broken when there's a large transparent surface Alpha materials sometimes render portals or the real world behind them, ignoring other geometry entirely Workaround Attempt: Re-ordering and further separating models did not solve it Pros: None — this setup makes transparency unusable Conclusion There appears to be a regression in RealityKit’s handling of transparency and sorting in visionOS 26, particularly when: OpacityComponent is applied dynamically, and Scenes rely on multiple overlapping transparent materials. These issues did not exist prior to 26, and the same project (no code changes) behaves correctly on previous versions. Request We’d appreciate any insight or confirmation from Apple engineers regarding: Whether alpha sorting or opacity blending behavior changed in visionOS 26 If there are new recommended practices for combining OpacityComponent with transparent materials If a bug report already exists for this regression Thanks in advance!

Game Controller Input Limitations in visionOS Volumetric Windows Hello Apple Developer Community, I'm developing a game for visionOS and have encountered significant limitations with game controller input when using volumetric windows (WindowGroup with .volumetric style). I'd appreciate clarification on whether this is expected behavior and any guidance on best practices. 🧩 Issue Summary When using a DualSense controller with a volumetric window in visionOS, only a subset of controller inputs are available to the app. The remaining inputs appear to be reserved by the system for UI navigation. ✅ Working Inputs (Volumetric Window) D-Pad (all directions) L3 (left thumbstick button click) R3 (right thumbstick button click) Menu button Options button ❌ Not Working Inputs (Volumetric Window) Left thumbstick analog movement (used for UI scrolling instead) Right thumbstick analog movement (used for UI scrolling instead) Face buttons (Cross, Circle, Square, Triangle / A, B, X, Y) Shoulder buttons (L1, R1) Triggers (L2, R2) Key observation: When moving the left thumbstick in a volumetric window, the window's UI scrolls vertically instead of sending input to my app's GameController handlers. Similarly, face buttons seem to be reserved for system UI interactions. ⚙️ Implementation Details I'm using the standard GameController framework: Connect to controller via GCController.controllers() Access extendedGamepad profile Set up valueChangedHandler and pressedChangedHandler for all inputs Handlers confirmed registered via logging Working inputs (D-Pad, L3, R3) trigger immediately and consistently Non-working inputs (thumbsticks, face buttons) never trigger 🧠 Critical Finding: ImmersiveSpace Works Perfectly When testing the exact same code in an ImmersiveSpace (.mixed immersion style), all controller inputs work perfectly: ✅ Both thumbsticks provide full analog input ✅ All face buttons trigger their handlers ✅ All shoulder buttons and triggers work correctly ✅ 100% success rate with no intermittent issues This suggests the issue isn't with my code, but rather how visionOS handles controller input differently between Volumetric Windows and ImmersiveSpace. 🧪 Test Environment I created a minimal test project (Controller-Playground) to isolate the issue: A simple ControllerTester class that registers all GameController handlers A visual UI showing real-time input state No game logic, RealityKit physics, or other complexity Results In volumetric window: Only D-Pad, L3, R3, Menu, Options work In ImmersiveSpace: All inputs work perfectly This confirms the limitation exists at the visionOS platform level, not in app code. 🧰 Attempted Workarounds I tried the following without success: Setting GCSupportsControllerUserInteraction = false in Info.plist Setting UIRequiresFullScreen = true Changing window styles (.plain, .volumetric) Polling vs. handler-based input approaches Various threading models (MainActor, separate thread) Result: The only way to enable full controller support is to switch to ImmersiveSpace. ❓ Questions for Apple Is this input reservation behavior in volumetric windows intended and documented? Are game controllers expected to have limited functionality in volumetric windows while full functionality is reserved for ImmersiveSpace? Is there a way to request full controller input access in a volumetric window, or is ImmersiveSpace the only option for complete controller support? Where can I find official documentation about controller input differences between window types? Are there any APIs or configuration options to disable system controller shortcuts in volumetric windows? 🎯 Impact This limitation has a significant effect on game design and architecture: Volumetric windows offer a multitasking-friendly, less immersive experience ImmersiveSpace provides full controller support but may be more immersive than some games require Games that only need basic D-Pad and button input can work fine in volumetric windows Games requiring analog sticks or face buttons must currently use ImmersiveSpace It would be very helpful if Apple could clarify or reference existing documentation regarding controller input handling in different visionOS window types. If such documentation doesn't exist yet, it might be valuable to include this information in future developer guides or best-practice documents. 🕹 Current Workaround For now, I'm using: D-Pad for character movement (digital 8-direction) R3 (right stick click) as a substitute for the "X" button This setup allows the game to function within a volumetric window, though full controller support still requires ImmersiveSpace. 📄 Request If this is expected behavior, I may have simply missed the relevant documentation — could you please point me to any existing resources that explain this design? If there isn't one yet, it would be great if future visionOS documentation could: Clearly outline controller input behavior across window types Provide guidance on when to use Volumetric Windows vs. ImmersiveSpace for games Consider adding an API option to request full controller access when appropriate If this is not expected behavior, I'm happy to file a detailed bug report with sample code. 💻 System Information visionOS: Latest Simulator Xcode: Latest version Controller: Sony DualSense Framework: GameController (standard extendedGamepad profile) Test project: Minimal reproducible example available Thank you for any clarification or guidance you can provide. This information would be valuable for many developers working on visionOS games.

Hi. I am mixing content destined for Vision Pro. Locked to video. I have the AAX installer and the ASAF video player demonstrated in the quicktimes is nit included in the install package for pro tools. Would it be possible to post a link ?

When assigning a ManipulationComponent to an Entity SceneEvents.WillRemoveEntity will be called for that Entity. Expected Behavior: the Entity is not (even if temporarily) removed from the Scene and no SceneEvents will be triggered as a result of assigning a ManipulationComponent. FB20872220

Hi, Few days ago, Apple had another "Meet with Apple" event regarding immersive video : Create immersive media experiences for visionOS | Meet with Apple days one and 2 and it is not appearing on my Developer app in Mac. The same happened to IETF HLS Interest Day | Meet with Apple. Any tip? Kind regards , Bruno

I want to let users place 2D/3D “artworks” on detected walls and have them reappear in exactly the same real‑world spot after quitting and relaunching the app (like widgets do, but for my own entities).Environment: Xcode 26, visionOS 2.0, RealityKit + ARKitSession/WorldTrackingProvider Entities are parented to a holder that’s aligned to a wall via plane/mesh raycasts. What I’ve tried: Create a WorldAnchor at placement, save UUID + full 4×4 transform On next launch, re-create the WorldAnchor (or set the saved transform) and attach the entity Gate restore on relocalization/mesh updates and disable all raycast/search after restore Issue: After relaunch, placement still resolves relative to current device pose, not the same wall position. Questions: Is there a public API in visionOS 2.0 to persist app‑managed world anchors across sessions (room‑fixed), e.g., AnchorStore or equivalent? If not, what’s the recommended pattern to reliably restore wall‑anchored content? Are persistence features mentioned for widgets/windows available to third‑party RealityKit entities?

I want to let users place 2D/3D “artworks” on detected walls and have them reappear in exactly the same real‑world spot after quitting and relaunching the app (like widgets do, but for my own entities).Environment: Xcode 26, visionOS 2.0, RealityKit + ARKitSession/WorldTrackingProvider Entities are parented to a holder that’s aligned to a wall via plane/mesh raycasts What I’ve tried: Create a WorldAnchor at placement, save UUID + full 4×4 transform On next launch, re-create the WorldAnchor (or set the saved transform) and attach the entity Gate restore on relocalization/mesh updates and disable all raycast/search after restore Issue: After relaunch, placement still resolves relative to current device pose, not the same wall position. Questions: Is there a public API in visionOS 2.0 to persist app‑managed world anchors across sessions (room‑fixed), e.g., AnchorStore or equivalent? If not, what’s the recommended pattern to reliably restore wall‑anchored content? Are persistence features mentioned for widgets/windows available to third‑party RealityKit entities?

My app is getting video from UVC device, and I wish to display it in an Immersive Space. But when I open Immersive Space, the UVC capture will just stop.AI said it's due to confliction in Camera pipeline. But I don't really understand, I don't need to use any on device camera, why it conflict with my UVC...

For the M2 Apple Vision Pro, there's "a general guideline, we recommend no more than 500 thousand triangles for an immersive scene, with 250 thousand for applications in the shared space." --https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2024/10186/?time=147 Is there a revised recommendation for the M5 Apple Vision Pro?

I'm currently implementing 180° / 360° immersive video for my app. I easily implemented 360° by just applying VideoMaterial to flipped sphere. But I'm stuck at 180°. I'm trying to implement by applying VideoMaterial to hemisphere (half sphere). I want to make VideoMaterial to be visible half front sphere and half back sphere transparent / clear. Would there be any advice / information / idea to implement this? Your help would be grateful.

Hi, I'm currently implementing 180° / 360° property for immersive video in my app. I was able to implement 360° easily by just giving VideoMaterial to flipped sphere. However, I'm bit stuck at 180°. I want to implement by setting VideoMaterial to hemisphere mesh. But since RealityKit doesn't provide default function such like MeshResource.generateHemisphere yet, I just want to apply VideoMaterial half front visible, and half back transparent. I thought this would make my sphere looks like hemisphere. But I can't find my way to implement this method.. I would appreciate any advice / idea / information that might help.

I am testing out the Gen 2 of the developer strap on my Vision Pro M2 and I have only been able to get USB 2 speeds when connecting it to my MacBook Pro Max M3. I used the official Apple Thunderbolt 4 cable, which does get Thunderbolt speeds on my T7 Touch drive. Has anyone figured out a solution for this issue? The Gen 2 developer strap does advertise 20 Gb/s speeds.

Hi I know it's possible to play equirectangular VR180 video either SBS or MV-HEVC. And for fisheye video, the only way I know is to convert it into an AIVU for playback. Is there any way to directly play fisheye video using AVPlayer? Thanks a lot!

I've been experimenting with the Muse pen and understand that it can be accessed by my app through a SpatialTrackingSession, but is there any current or planned support for devices like this as for general UI input like game controllers are? For example, using the button as a tap analogue for SwiftUI views.

I am building a 360 photo viewer in VisionOS 26. Which allows the user to choose a 2 by 1 jpg and then renders it with a sphere mesh entity. And I use: TextureResource(contentsOf: url, options: options). I noticed two situations here in terms of mipmaps options. When setting "mipmapsMode: .none": The graphic quality within the "gaze area" looks sharp and clear The two poles (top and bottom) are perfectly rendered Massive shimmer around the "gaze area" When setting "mipmapsMode: .allocateAndGenerateAll": The graphic looks slightly blurrier than in ".none" within the "gaze area" The two poles are very blurry and hard to recognize the texture Much less shimmer around the "gaze area" My question would be: Is there a way to have the perfect graphic quality in ".none" without the massive shimmer? Thank you! Screenshots: mipmapsMode: .none mipmapsMode: .allocateAndGenerateAll

I have an open Feedback conversation with Apple on this topic, but I am curious if others have run into this, or want to try out my sample code in their set up. there are two API’s for reading controller buttons, axis, and D pads: GCPhysicalInputProfile and GCControllerLiveInput. There are inconsistencies in behaviour between the two of them. Apple recommends we use GCControllerLiveInput, however, there are some capabilities on these controllers that are only accessible through GCPhysicalInputProfile, as I’ll discuss below. PSVR2 R2/L2 buttons, a.k.a. triggers, have force input analogue values. These can only be accessed on GCPhysicalInputProfile PSVR2 thumbstick direction values are read through “axes” on GCPhysicalInputProfile, but only “dpads” on GCControllerLiveInput on both GCPhysicalInputProfile and GCControllerLiveInput, All pressed events of all buttons are fired properly using generic aliases ( Trigger, Grip ,Menu, Right Thumbstick, Left Thumbstick, Right Button A & B (Circle & Cross), Left Button A&B (Triangle and Square) ). Apple reserves the system button as the equivalent of a home button for the OS. on GCPhysicalInputProfile, touch events are fired when the button is also pressed, but not for only touches. on GCControllerLiveInput , Touch events only works for the following buttons: Left Thumbstick, Right Thumbstick, Right Button A (Circle), and Right Button B (Cross). But Right Button B touch event isn’t labelled correctly, it fires as the Right Button A event. I observed this inside ALVR which uses a polling based approach to event processing: https://github.com/alvr-org/alvr-visionos/blob/17b5968f9d894944b53e97134b39dfce0993302a/ALVRClient/WorldTracker.swift#L301 To simplify to see this on a very simple app, I used the Apple example TrackingAccessories application: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/ARKit/tracking-accessories-in-volumetric-windows I’ve attached the code that replaces the AccessoryTrackingModel class. I added code that prints out what is touched/pressed, see the trackAllConnectedSpatialControllers method: https://github.com/svrc/TrackingAccessories

Hi, we've developed an app for Vision Pro that utilises the GroupActivitites SDK to provide shared experiences for our users. Remote Participation works great, but we can't get nearby sharing to work. The behaviour we're observing: User 1 engages share sheet from Volume, 2nd Vision Pro is visible. User 1 starts nearby sharing Session initialisation runs for approx. 30 seconds, then fails Sometimes, the nearby participant doesn't show up at all after the initialisation has failed once. As stated in the Configure your visionOS app for sharing with people nearby article, we didn't make any changes to our implementation to support nearby sharing. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Kind regards, David

Hi All, We're a studio building an app and as part of a scene we have a 3D asset with a smoke particle emitter and a curved mesh that plays video. I notice that when the video alone is played or the particle effect alone is done then the scene works fine but the frame rate drops drastically when both are turned on. How do I solve this because this is an important storytelling feature.

Hello, I've pre-ordered the Logitech Muse with hopes of developing with it, but have yet to find any documentation relating to the capabilities it will have/any APIs that will be available to take advantage of the Muse. Is anyone aware of what might become available? Thank you in advance.

I'm trying to add a feature to my app to allow a user to import items from other apps, like Safari, via the share sheet. I've done this many times on iOS/iPadOS easily with a Share Extension. From what I can tell, Xcode tells me share extensions are not available on visionOS - though my experience on device tells me differently (It seems Reminders, Notes & more implement them somehow.) I was finally able to get it working on device only...but I can now no longer test in the simulator, and have not found a way to distribute this app. When attempting to run on the simulator, I get this issue: Please try again later. Appex bundle at /Users/jason/Library/Developer/CoreSimulator/Devices/09A70160-4F4F-4F5E-B679-F6F7D876D7EF/data/Library/Caches/com.apple.mobile.installd.staging/temp.6OAEZp/extracted/LaunchBar.app/PlugIns/LaunchBarShareExtension.appex with id co.swiftfox.LaunchBar.ShareExtension specifies a value (com.apple.share-services) for the NSExtensionPointIdentifier key in the NSExtension dictionary in its Info.plist that does not correspond to a known extension point. When trying to archive an upload to test flight, I get this similar error: Invalid Info.plist value. The value for the key 'DTPlatformName' in bundle LaunchBar.app/PlugIns/LaunchBarShareExtension.appex is invalid. (ID: 207610c7-b7e1-48be-959b-22a43cd32d16) The app is for visionOS only - which I'm thinking might be the problem? The share extension is "Designed For iPhone" and requires me to include iPhone as a run destination. In the worst case I can build an iPhone UI for the app but I'd rather not, as it is very specific to visionOS. Has anyone successfully launched a share extension on a visionOS only app? I have an iPad app with a share extension that shows up fine on visionOS, but the issue seems to be specifically with visionOS only apps.