Meta has shut down Supernatural, its popular VR fitness app, laying off the entire staff as part of a broader 1,500-person reduction in its Reality Labs division. The move signals Meta’s dramatic pivot away from virtual reality toward artificial intelligence investments, abandoning the metaverse vision that CEO Mark Zuckerberg championed just years ago.
Supernatural, which Meta acquired for over $400 million in 2023, offered immersive VR workout experiences where users wielded virtual baseball bats to hit targets synchronized with popular music. The app maintained a passionate community of 113,000 members on Facebook, many of whom credit it with transforming their health and fitness routines. While the app will continue to exist temporarily as a frozen snapshot, users worry that music licensing expirations will gradually degrade the experience.
Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth explained the decision by stating that “VR is growing less quickly than we hoped,” necessitating right-sized investments. This comes after Meta burned nearly $20 billion on VR in 2025 alone, part of over $70 billion invested in the metaverse vision since the company’s 2019 rebrand.
The shutdown has sparked fierce backlash from Supernatural’s devoted user base, with one fan creating a Change.org petition that garnered over 7,000 signatures demanding Meta either revamp or spin off the app. Users expressed feelings of betrayal, with many describing how the app helped them lose weight, manage diabetes, and maintain mental health during difficult times.
Former FTC Chair Lina Khan seized on the moment as vindication of her 2022 attempt to block Meta’s acquisition of Supernatural’s parent company, Within Unlimited. Khan argued this exemplifies why antitrust laws exist: “a dominant platform eliminating choice by buying up the competition and then abandoning the market when corporate priorities shift.” She warned courts to consider this precedent “especially as they evaluate Meta’s acquisitions in artificial intelligence and other emerging markets.”
Meta’s new strategic focus is building “personal superintelligence” through AI-powered smart glasses with built-in cameras and microphones. The company has invested billions in data centers and recruited top AI talent from Google DeepMind, OpenAI, and Apple to pursue this vision, though results have been limited so far.
Key Quotes
This is exactly what antitrust laws are designed to prevent: a dominant platform eliminating choice by buying up the competition and then abandoning the market when corporate priorities shift.
Former FTC Chair Lina Khan made this statement to Business Insider, vindicated after her 2022 attempt to block Meta’s Supernatural acquisition. She specifically warned that courts should consider this precedent when evaluating Meta’s AI acquisitions, suggesting heightened regulatory scrutiny ahead.
We’re still continuing to invest heavily in this space, but obviously, VR is growing less quickly than we hoped. And so you want to make sure that your investment is right-sized.
Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth explained the decision to shut down Supernatural and lay off 1,500 Reality Labs employees. This statement effectively acknowledges Meta’s metaverse bet failed, clearing the path for AI-focused investments.
I think he’s putting all his chips on the AI glasses, and I just don’t see society buying into it.
John Hansknecht, a 62-year-old Supernatural user who created a Change.org petition to save the app, expressed skepticism about Meta’s pivot to AI-powered smart glasses. His comment reflects broader user distrust of Meta’s ability to execute on its new AI vision after abandoning VR.
The question is, why did we ever think that corporations were ethical in the first place?
Yale anthropology professor Lisa Messeri, author of ‘In the Land of the Unreal,’ responded to questions about the ethics of Meta collecting years of user data and emotional investment before abandoning the product. She argues the tech industry has benefited from an ’endurable myth’ that better technology automatically equals social progress.
Our Take
Meta’s Supernatural shutdown is a microcosm of the AI gold rush reshaping Silicon Valley. The company’s willingness to abandon a $400 million acquisition and alienate passionate users reveals how completely artificial intelligence has captured corporate imagination and capital allocation. This isn’t just about one fitness app—it’s about the end of the metaverse era and the beginning of an AI-dominated technology landscape.
What’s particularly striking is the regulatory dimension. Lina Khan’s vindication strengthens the case for aggressive antitrust enforcement in AI markets, where Meta, Google, Microsoft, and others are acquiring startups at breakneck speed. If acquisitions can be abandoned when priorities shift, the competitive harm becomes clear.
The human cost matters too. Thousands of users built health routines and communities around Supernatural, only to have it yanked away for a strategic pivot. This erodes trust in corporate platforms precisely when companies need user buy-in for AI-powered products like smart glasses that require even more intimate data access.
Why This Matters
This story represents a critical inflection point in Big Tech’s strategic priorities, illustrating how rapidly companies are abandoning previous “next big thing” investments to chase AI dominance. Meta’s willingness to write off a $400 million acquisition and years of development demonstrates the overwhelming gravitational pull of artificial intelligence on corporate resources and attention.
The Supernatural shutdown validates regulatory concerns about tech giants acquiring competitors only to shut them down when priorities shift, providing ammunition for antitrust enforcement in AI markets where Meta and others are aggressively acquiring startups. Lina Khan’s warning about AI acquisitions suggests regulators will scrutinize future deals more carefully.
For the broader tech industry, this signals that the VR/metaverse era has definitively ended, at least for now, with AI becoming the singular focus of innovation investment. Companies betting on immersive technologies face an increasingly difficult funding environment as capital flows toward generative AI and machine learning applications. The human cost—both employees losing jobs and users losing beloved products—highlights the volatility of depending on corporate platforms for health, community, and wellbeing in an era of rapid technological pivots.
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Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/zuckerberg-meta-layoffs-vr-supernatural-2026-1