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Quest v74 Brings Web Shortcuts, DisplayPort Out, Improved Casting & More
Quest v74 brings web shortcuts, the system menu in Quest Link, DisplayPort Out to external monitors, improved casting, and more. Read about all the changes here.
Quest v74 is starting to roll out, bringing web shortcuts in Library, the system menu to Quest Link, DisplayPort Out to external monitors, improved casting, and more.
As with all Meta Horizon OS updates, v74 will "roll out" gradually, so it may take a few days or even weeks for your headset to get the v74 update. Further, Meta rolls out some features separately to the main update itself, so even having the v74 update doesn't guarantee having everything listed here yet.
Web Shortcuts In Library
With Quest v74, you can now add a shortcut to any web URL to your Library.
To do so, open Browser, select the menu icon at the top right, and select 'Add this page to your library'.
Clicking the shortcuts you create will open the URL as its own minimalist window, without the tab and URL bar interface of Browser, as you can see in the screenshot above.
Meta has already added certain website shortcuts to the store, presented as if apps, such as Peacock, Wordle, and Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. But now you can choose any website yourself.
DisplayPort Out To External Displays
It's been possible to wirelessly cast your Quest view to the phone app, PC app, website, or Google Cast TV devices. Now, with Quest v74, you can output your view to external displays such as TVs and monitors via USB-C DisplayPort, otherwise known as DisplayPort Alt Mode.
Meta says the feature offers "high resolution and low latency."
Combined with a capture card and PC, the feature could be ideal for video content creators and livestreamers, as unlike regular casting it doesn't require a Wi-Fi network and the quality and latency won't be affected by network conditions. It should also be useful for standalone demos at trade shows.
Improved Wireless Casting Reliability
For those using wireless casting, to the phone app, PC app, website, or Google Cast TV devices, Meta says it has "significantly improved the reliability" of this feature in Quest v74.
Just over a year ago the company removed the TV casting capability, citing reliability issues, before adding it back less than two weeks later following widespread complaints. It's possible that v74 is seeing the planned reliability fixes Meta hinted at in its explanation arrive.
System Menu In Quest Link
When using Quest Link, the official feature for making your Quest act as a PC VR headset, you've traditionally been unable to bring up the Quest system menu. Instead, uniquely on Quest (no other app or experience works like this), pressing the Meta/Oculus button on the right Touch controller would bring up the PC-based Rift menu bar.
Now, with Quest v74, Meta says Quest Link "includes system tray support, giving quick access to device status and quick actions while Meta Quest Link is running in the background".
It's unclear whether or not this means the PC-side Rift menu bar has been removed.
Minimized 2D Apps Now Shown
With Quest v74, Meta says minimized 2D apps are now "shown above the universal menu, making it easy to see which applications are still open".
Beforehand there was no indication of minimized 2D apps. You'd just see whichever 2D apps you had open, the three attached to the dock in addition to up to three undocked into a position in space.
Meta hasn't yet released a screenshot of what the new minimized app visibility will look like.
Seamless Multitasking No Longer Experimental
Since launch for Quest Pro and Quest 3 and since early 2023 for Quest 2 you've been able to bring up the browser or other 2D windows while inside an immersive app. And since v62 you've been able to bring up the up to three 2D windows you had in the home space in these apps.
But to resume interacting with the immersive app again, you needed to minimize the 2D windows you had open. Footage by UploadVR.
Quest v69 added a new Seamless Multitasking experimental option, which lets you continue to interact with the immersive app while your 2D windows are open. This means you can, for example, watch Netflix or YouTube while playing a VR game. It has a performance penalty, but apps that use dynamic resolution should scale down their resolution to adapt.
Now, with Quest v74, Meta says this feature is no longer experimental, and should be "rolling out" to everyone.
Multi-Room Space Setup
Since v62 one year ago, Quest headsets have been able to remember the 3D mesh you scanned for multiple rooms, up to 15 in fact.
Now, with Quest v74, Meta will let you scan multiple rooms in one scanning session, letting you walk around your home and sequentially scan each room. Each room will still be saved as a separate scan, though, to be clear.
David Heaney
This update should make it easier to set up for experiences that span your entire home, a concept Meta's SDKs added support for back in July.
Travel Detection
Last year Quest 2 and Quest 3 got a Travel Mode, and Quest 3S launched with it. Travel Mode makes the headset's positional tracking work while in a moving vehicle, with official support for airplanes originally and trains too since v71.
But Why Is A Travel Mode Needed In The First Place?
People often think that markerless inside-out tracking systems on headsets, glasses, and self-tracking controllers only use the cameras, but this isn't the case. These systems rely just as much on the inertial measurement unit (IMU), a chip that contains a tiny accelerometer and gyroscope.
While cameras typically run at 30Hz or 60Hz, the IMU typically provides updates around 1000Hz, enabling much lower latency. However, an IMU can't actually detect absolute movement - at least not directly. The accelerometer in the IMU senses acceleration relative to gravity, and you can take the integral of acceleration over time to get velocity. And if you again take the integral of those velocity values over time, you get displacement from the original position.
This process is called dead reckoning. From moment to moment, it’s how every headset and controller tracks itself, and the optical aspect like cameras or laser base stations are essentially only used to correct for the cumulative error that results from the noisiness of IMU data. But in a moving vehicle the accelerometer will pick up the acceleration of the vehicle itself, thinking it's the headset itself moving, which results in sudden and rapid positional drifting.
Now, with Quest v74, Meta says the headset should detect when you're in a moving vehicle and suggest enabling Travel Mode with a pop-up, removing the need to manually know to enable it.
Night Display Passthrough Improvements
Night Display, known as Night Shift on Apple's iOS and Night Light on Google's Android, is a toggle which adjusts the display colors to warmer hues to emit less blue light, which some research suggests might disrupt sleep.
In Quest v74, Meta says it has updated Night Display to "improve the consistency of color balance, white point and warmth in passthrough experiences".
Spatial Audio For 2D Calling Apps
In v69 Meta added spatial audio for 2D windows, meaning audio emitted by them will sound like they're coming from the window's position in space.
With Quest v74, Meta says this will now work for calling apps too, such as WhatsApp or Horizon calls via the built-in People app, suggesting these kinds of apps didn't work with the v69 implementation.
App Crash Detection & Reporting
In Quest v74, Meta says it has added a new dialog for when an app crashes, with the option to report the problem. It's unclear whether this report would go to Meta, the app developer, or both.
