Apple’s Vision Pro layoffs in August touched more than 200 employees across multiple teams, with CEO John Ternus using the cuts to kill the Vision Air and push the next Vision Pro beyond 2028. The company first disclosed around 100 job reductions in the Vision Products Group last month, centered on gaming and immersive video. Those cuts reflected a strategic shift as Apple determined that immersive video content, which costs millions to produce, has not justified its expense given how few Vision Pro owners actually engage with it.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports the reductions extended well beyond the gaming and immersive video divisions that bore the initial round. The latest reporting shows the layoffs also reached staff responsible for device security, audio engineering, Siri integration, testing, and visionOS development across the wider organization.
The layoffs extended into visionOS teams because the operating system now serves multiple device categories. Apple is developing smart glasses, code-named N50, which are still on track for launch next year and is expected to run the same spatial computing software as the Vision Pro. Cuts to visionOS, Siri integration, and audio engineering therefore affect work spanning both the headset and the upcoming glasses platform.
John Ternus eliminated two Vision Pro successors
John Ternus, who officially took the CEO role on September 1, 2026, has been openly skeptical of the Vision Pro since its launch, viewing it as too bulky and too expensive to reach a mainstream audience. People inside the Vision Pro group spent months lobbying Ternus to stay the course even as sales underwhelmed, but his doubts prevailed. According to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Ternus nixed plans for a second Vision Pro generation and canceled the lighter Vision Air device outright, a direct reversal of the multi-product strategy that framed Apple’s spatial computing ambitions under Tim Cook.
Ternus has signaled he would consider abandoning head-worn devices as a category altogether if they fail to gain consumer traction. That conditional openness also clouds the future of the Vision Pro successor, code-named N224, which is not expected before the end of 2028 at the earliest.
Apple stated that the organizational changes were made “to evolve our business to deliver the best experiences for our users” and that the company is “committed to supporting them throughout their transition, including opportunities to apply for other roles at Apple.”
Ternus’s direction signals a decisive pivot away from the Vision Pro as Apple’s flagship spatial computing device toward lighter, mass-market smart glasses as the true long-term bet. By cutting deeper into Vision Pro and visionOS infrastructure rather than protecting the headset’s roadmap, the new CEO has effectively signaled which category he believes will succeed. The smart glasses project, which remains on track and retains executive support, now stands as Apple’s primary spatial computing initiative, with the Vision Pro reduced to a premium niche product on indefinite hold.
