A steady growth in virtual reality headset shipments to regular buyers has coincided with a sharp spike in the rise of virtual reality adult content, or VR porn, according to a recent study by publication Bankless Times. The study, which tracks the launch of VR headsets and searches for VR porn through Google Trends data and search engine optimisation (SEO) tracker Ahrefs, said that there is a clear correlation between the two – leading to a sharp spike in interest in VR porn at the onset of 2022.
Why is VR Porn Trending?
The report cites data from the International Data Corporation (IDC), a market research firm, to state that shipments of VR headsets grew by 92 percent year on year in 2021, in comparison to 2020. With this sharp jump in purchases of VR headsets, the report notes Ahrefs data to state that VR porn searches saw its second highest spike in history by registering over 920,000 searches in January this year.
Incidentally, the highest number of searches for VR porn came in December 2016, when Facebook launched Oculus and touch controls to go with it. During this month, over 1.2 million global searches for VR porn were reportedly made. It is important to note that in 2016, virtual reality in the consumer space was at an even earlier stage, but also had a novelty factor among general users – which could have led to the spike for adult virtual reality content.
Immersive media, however, has continued to remain bit-part at best, which is likely why the rise in the number of searches for such content has grown in proportion with spike in sales of headsets. The report added that the Oculus Quest 2 VR headset was launched in the last quarter of 2020, which subsequently saw a rise in traffic for VR pornography in January 2021 – at close to 580,000 searches.
The report has also noted that the end of the year holiday season is the peak time for VR headsets to be sold around the world – which coincides with spikes in searches for immersive adult content as well.
