Starting toward the end of 2017, the number of listed job openings at Oculus has nearly tripled, with the current number of openings floating around an all time high.

Across Oculus’ 15 locations, the company is currently listing 443 available openings, spanning 20 categories from Research to Software Engineering to Computer Vision, and more. The number of openings has spiked significantly since November, data collected from the last 20 months by Road to VR shows.

Data collected by Road to VR

The spike comes at the end of 2017 and into the New Year. While that might coincide with annual budget planning, job openings at the company during the 2016 to 2017 transition didn’t show anything comparable to what’s been seen from Oculus’ hiring since November 2017.

A spokesperson for Oculus tells Road to VR, “Overall, the growing number of job openings across AR and VR are an indication of the level of commitment that Facebook/Oculus is making in the VR space.”

Corresponding with the company’s hiring spree, a promotional recruiting video was released last week extolling the benefits of working in the Oculus Research department, which currently has a record high 80 job openings:

Back in 2014, shortly after Facebook’s acquisition of Oculus and the formation of Oculus Research, the company’s chief scientist, Michael Abrash, called it the “first complete, well funded VR research team in close to 20 years.” In early 2017, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg publicly toured the Oculus Research facility and shared an inside look.

Oculus’ clear room for nanofabrication | Image courtesy Oculus

Earlier this month Facebook announced that it was a founding partner of the University of Washington’s Reality Lab. Based in Seattle, home of Oculus Research, the $6 million venture “creates one of the world’s first academic centers dedicated to virtual and augmented reality,” Facebook says.

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Oculus Research Reveals New Multi-focal Display Tech

With some 60 internship, co-op, and PHD student openings, it’s clear that Oculus hopes to take advantage of the Reality Lab as an incubator for future AR/VR research talent.

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Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."
  • Ted Joseph

    If facebook can pull off a non tethered, high res (well capable of current res), online – wifi (no lag!) system, I am sold! I am having a blast with the Oculus currently, but the freedom of not worrying about the tether to a PC = priceless!

    • Jistuce

      I hope research shows them a way to make the thing fit nicely over glasses.

      • I’m betting they will remove the need for glasses with a headset that adjusts the lens focus for the user automatically.

        • Walextheone

          That would be a very nice feature if it’s doable

    • brubble

      +1. Ive tried it but it just wasnt “there” for me yet. Im waiting for the next new and improved version and I’ll jump in.

    • gothicvillas

      We are 5 years away from good untethered VR headsets. Dont hold your breath on Santa Cruz etc.

      • daveinpublic

        Unless they put an HDMI in, allowing it to be used for both wireless and also as a monitor for traditional PC games.

        • dogbite

          Most people seem to want higher fov and resolution. Pimax has moved to DP and may even need 2 DP ports on the 8KX version to avoid scaling (and a nuclear reactor gpu or 2). Don’t think HDMI’s bandwidth will meet the “good” definition. I’m inclined to agree with Carmack. In 5 years we will likely have hit the Moore’s Law wall. Really good coders will be the order of the day. How good we can get in wireless is going to be interesting to watch.

      • NooYawker

        5 years goes by really fast. For me anyway.. time moves a lot fast the closer you get to 50.

  • Ritch

    Behind all those doors are prototypes consumers will likely not experience for years. Feel sorry for all the Vr devs restricted by todays crap resolution specs. VR video is hopeless with current hardwarw

    • Really? I use the Rift on a daily basis and think it’s great as it is, ok sure, objects at a distance don’t look great, but it’s fine right now. It bugs me when people keep saying it’s crap, as it either means you don’t have one or you’ve got bad eye sight.

      • gothicvillas

        Videos in VR look terrible. I run Titan X and Vive machine, max sampling etc. Videos are unwatchable. I think he was reffering to video playback quality. I can only agree, all these 360 videos are terrible due to the low res.
        Big Screen is a nice app to play around but come on, it is not for watching vids :)

        • yes, so vr video resolution is the problem, not the VR hardware. Current VR hardware resolution is fine for 99% of things. I don’t watch VR videos myself as I don’t see that as VR, it’s just videos and the resolutrion is so low due to the massive data requirements for full 360 degree 3D video.

          • Jorge Piqueras

            Well I work in a company that makes 360 videos and I can tell you that the problem is the hardware, when we see the videos in the computer the quality is good but when you see it in oculus or vive its like…. Why ??? You can have videos filmed with a lot of gopros with an amazing quality but if the hardware dont support it …

          • okay then, why are 360 photos so much higher quality than 360 video if it’s a hardware thing. And by hardware, I just mean the HMD’s, not the GPU or CPU on the PC.

          • Jorge Piqueras

            You can show higher resolution in photos than in video due to video codecs, despite that, the quality of the video is limited by the screen of the HMD`s.

  • CURTROCK

    Is there any doubt that Oculus/FB is playing the long game in VR? This is the type of “all-in” commitment I was hoping for when FB bought Oculus. VR will succeed, because of this type of commitment.

    • Marcella

      Gℴogle paying to people of every age 98 US dollars hourly to work parttime from home .. Labor for few time and spend greater time with your circle of relatives … Any person can also do this possibility…last Thursday I bought a brand new Lotus Elise after I been earnin $12659 last six weeks .it is the coolest job however you wo’nt forgive yourself if you don’t look it.!pg892k:➝➝➝ http://GoogleTeamCallJournalsJobsReport1/easy/jobs ♥x♥y♥p♥♥♥s♥♥v♥♥m♥y♥♥t♥♥♥v♥♥a♥u♥♥♥a♥♥♥i♥♥e♥♥♥b♥♥d♥♥♥a♥s♥♥n♥♥g♥♥s♥♥z♥v♥l♥f:::::!rf713q:wkyuk

    • Get Schwifty!

      Yep.

    • NooYawker

      I don’t doubt they’re in it for the long haul, it’s an amazing source of information. But to call it “all in” is a stretch. they dropped 19 billion for whatsapp. What they’ve spend on VR is a drop in the bucket.
      Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad they’re doing what they’re doing. Without companies willing to take a loss to create this market it would be dead in the water.

    • Indeed. Oculus will be to VR what Apple is to mobile devices.

  • MosBen

    This makes sense for a 2019 launch of the Rift 2, with the Santa Cruz in there sometime as well. We’re far enough out that these new hires could contribute meaningfully to the project before it gets locked down for production. I’m hoping that the real second gen HMDs are sort of the final form of this type of VR tech, or at least close to it. Better FOV, better pixel density, better ergonomics/controllers, and wireless. There might be some improvements on that formula in a third generation, but they’ll be incremental improvements. I suspect that in the third or fourth generation we’ll see totally new approaches.

  • zflorence1

    I will be happy if research has led to an FOV increase of 15 to 20 degrees on each side, eye tracking, and higher resolution at a price between $399 and the original $599. Not expecting wireless or variable focus for CV2. Wireless is going to be for a different product category altogether, and variable focus would require extra internal hardware additions launching the price even higher. Thoughts?