Meta plans to cut up to 30% of investments in the metaverse in 2026

Source: PortaldoBitcoin Original Title: Meta plans to cut up to 30% of metaverse investments in 2026 Original Link: Meta is considering what is seen as its deepest restructuring since adopting its current name in 2021, with cuts that could reach 30% of the Reality Labs budget starting in 2026.

Company executives are internally discussing the possibility of significantly reducing spending on metaverse and virtual reality initiatives, far exceeding the roughly 10% adjustments requested from the rest of the company.

The unit responsible for Horizon Worlds and Quest headsets is reviewing scenarios that would decrease its budget by nearly a third, a move that could include layoffs early next year, although decisions are still being debated after November’s budget reviews.

Pressure on Reality Labs comes after accumulated losses exceeding $70 billion since 2021, reflecting slower progress in the metaverse than Meta had anticipated when it decided to make the concept the center of its strategy. Sources say the company no longer believes that the public and the industry are moving toward mass adoption of virtual worlds at the pace previously imagined, leading leadership to demand deeper cuts in the area.

Mark Zuckerberg himself has spent the last few years countering speculation that Meta had abandoned the metaverse, calling the narrative that its focus had shifted exclusively to AI “inaccurate.” Even so, the weak performance of Horizon Worlds and the rising costs of the division have intensified the pressure for adjustments.

The financial market reacted immediately. Meta’s stock, which closed Wednesday at $640, soared to $674 at the start of trading on Thursday before retreating to around $665 during the first hour of trading. Investor enthusiasm reflects the growing perception that the company is likely to prioritize products and areas with more tangible returns, such as its recent investments in artificial intelligence.

The new focus became especially clear with Zuckerberg’s push for the development of generative models and the launch of Ray-Ban smart glasses with AI, a product that has gained much more commercial traction than the virtual reality projects.

Meanwhile, the metaverse sector as a whole is facing an even deeper collapse in cryptocurrency markets. The Render token, previously one of the segment’s main representatives and based on the proposal of a decentralized network for 3D rendering and AI workloads, now has a market value below $1 billion and is no longer among the top 100 digital assets. Other flagship projects, such as Sandbox and Decentraland, are trading near historic lows.

Data from CoinGecko shows that the total capitalization of metaverse-related tokens has dropped to less than $3.4 billion, far from the more than $500 billion recorded at the start of 2025—a portrait of waning interest that reinforces Meta’s new pragmatic approach to the sector.