An Apple-Valve AR headset deal makes sense given iOS 13’s StarBoard

Apple rumors are perennially popular for two major reasons: First, the company’s actual announcements are so few and far between that only “what’s next?” speculation keeps its fans excited year-round. Second, the company is famously iterative, rarely entering a new product category without years of research and a multi-year “what’s next?” product pipeline in mind, constantly feeding the speculation.

If you follow the rumors, augmented reality hardware has been Apple’s next big thing for at least a couple of years. Following the release of ARKit software for developers, Apple CEO Tim Cook teased that Apple was working on something bigger, and this summer, a beta release of iOS 13 all but established that an Apple AR headset is headed to market. While it’s expected to be iPhone-dependent, no one’s quite sure how the headset will work, or what it will look like.