Credit: AI
For Meta Platforms, creating photorealistic 3D avatars of participants during video calls has been considered a key priority since the company first ventured into augmented and virtual reality. It is expected to share its progress in this area at the Connect 2026 event taking place next week.
One of the augmented reality devices Meta will showcase next week is the lightweight Project Phoenix headset; in terms of market positioning, it will be similar to the flagship Meta Quest Pro but will be lighter and more compact. The headset will come with a separate computing module, representing a compromise between portability and performance. Beyond entertainment, the creators also envision productivity-focused use cases for Phoenix; specifically, the headset is intended to replace large wall-mounted screens and will be suitable for watching movies. In some lines of program code, Meta refers to Phoenix as “virtual reality glasses,” and the device’s precise market positioning has not yet been determined.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth have already conducted an internal evaluation this month of the company’s devices’ ability to facilitate video calls featuring avatars that resemble 3D holograms. Following this, it was decided to showcase the “Codec Avatars” technology at the Connect 2026 event, where a real-time hologram of Bosworth will be displayed.
