Acceleration of Metaverse Platform Competition: Restructuring of the Virtual World Ecosystem and Investment Outlook by 2026
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Entering the Technological Maturity Phase of the Metaverse Market
As of 2026, the metaverse market is moving beyond the initial hype phase and entering a phase of genuine technological maturity. The global metaverse market size is expected to grow rapidly from $74.8 billion in 2025 to $124.7 billion in 2026, marking a 66.7% increase. This indicates that major platforms’ technological innovations and improvements in user experience are beginning to yield substantial results. Notably, the resolution of virtual reality (VR) headsets has improved to over 4K, and latency has been reduced to under 20ms, significantly enhancing user immersion and satisfaction.
Meta, headquartered in Menlo Park, California, recorded $6.3 billion in revenue from its Reality Labs division in the fourth quarter of 2025, achieving a 41% year-over-year growth. This success is attributed to the successful market entry of the Quest 3S headset and the monthly active users (MAU) of the metaverse platform Horizon Worlds surpassing 150 million. Meta’s Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Andrew Bosworth, recently announced, “The new Quest Pro 2 is scheduled for release in the first half of 2026, and this product will significantly enhance mixed reality (MR) capabilities, paving the way for entering the enterprise metaverse market.”
Meanwhile, Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, is attempting a differentiated approach through its enterprise metaverse solution, Mesh for Teams. As of 2025, the Microsoft Mesh platform is utilized by over 23,000 corporate clients worldwide, particularly excelling in remote collaboration and virtual meetings. Microsoft’s enterprise metaverse revenue reached $1.8 billion in 2025 and is projected to expand to $3.2 billion in 2026. This reflects the active adoption of metaverse technology by companies in hybrid work environments.
In South Korea, NAVER, headquartered in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, operates the metaverse platform ‘ZEPETO’ through its subsidiary NAVER Z, occupying a unique position in the Asian market. ZEPETO’s global cumulative user base has exceeded 400 million, with over 90% comprising young users in their teens and twenties. It holds a high market share particularly in Korea, Japan, and Southeast Asia, with user-generated content (UGC) transactions through ZEPETO Studio in 2025 increasing by 127% year-over-year, reaching 24 billion won.
AI Integration and Next-Generation Hardware Innovation
The most noteworthy change in the metaverse industry by 2026 is the full-scale integration of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. NVIDIA, based in Santa Clara, California, is building an AI-based metaverse infrastructure through its Omniverse platform, with Omniverse-related revenue reaching $1.5 billion in the fourth quarter of 2025, marking an 89% year-over-year growth. NVIDIA’s latest RTX 5090 GPU can simultaneously handle real-time ray tracing and AI-based object generation in metaverse environments, significantly enhancing the visual quality and interactivity of virtual worlds.
Particularly noteworthy is the advancement of AI avatar and NPC (Non-Player Character) technology. In December 2025, Meta announced ‘AI Studio 2.0′, enabling users to create AI characters capable of natural language conversations within the metaverse. Utilization rates for virtual stores and educational content using this technology increased by 340% in the initial three months, and users’ average stay time increased by 67% compared to before. This demonstrates that AI is becoming a core differentiating factor in the metaverse.
On the hardware front, Apple’s Vision Pro 2, launched in June 2025, is bringing a fresh breeze to the market. Supporting 8K resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate, the product recorded sales of 2.8 million units within six months of launch, capturing a 25% market share in the premium metaverse headset market. Apple’s visionOS platform currently hosts over 4,200 metaverse apps, with professional applications in architecture, healthcare, and education gaining high popularity.
Unity, based in San Francisco, California, maintains a strong position in the metaverse content creation tools sector. In 2025, Unity’s Create Solutions division recorded $1.9 billion in revenue, with metaverse-related projects accounting for 42% of this figure. The Unity 2023.3 LTS version supports developers in building more realistic virtual environments through real-time global illumination and AI-based animation systems. The Unity Cloud Build service has significantly simplified the distribution and update process of metaverse content, lowering entry barriers for small and medium-sized developers.
The game-centric metaverse platform Roblox achieved annual revenue of $4.8 billion in 2025, showing continuous growth. Roblox’s daily active users (DAU) reached 73.5 million, with the time spent on the platform totaling 65.8 billion hours annually. Notably, the scale of the virtual economy within Roblox is significant, with Robux earnings paid to developers reaching $812 million in 2025, a 34% increase from the previous year. This indicates that the metaverse is evolving beyond mere entertainment into a substantial economic ecosystem.
Market Outlook and Investment Opportunity Analysis
By 2026, the investment environment in the metaverse market is entering a phase of selective concentration. Venture capital and corporate investors are moving away from broad initial investments to focus on companies with proven technological capabilities and clear revenue models. The global investment in metaverse-related ventures was $18.7 billion in 2025, a 23% decrease from 2024, but the average investment size increased by 31% to $42 million. This suggests that investors are selectively making large-scale investments in more mature companies.
In the domestic metaverse market, Kakao, headquartered in Gangnam, Seoul, is expanding its metaverse game publishing business through Kakao Games. Kakao Games recorded metaverse game revenue of 184.7 billion won in 2025, achieving notable success in MMORPG-based metaverse content like ‘ArcheAge War’. Kakao plans to launch its own metaverse platform ‘Kakao World’ in the first half of 2026, offering a differentiated social metaverse experience to domestic users through integration with the existing KakaoTalk messenger.
The growth of the enterprise metaverse market is also noteworthy. According to Deloitte’s latest report, the enterprise metaverse market size is expected to reach $23.4 billion by 2026, approximately four times the size in 2023. High growth rates are observed particularly in remote education and training, virtual meetings, and digital twin technology fields. Global manufacturers like Boeing, Volkswagen, and Siemens are implementing virtual factory simulations and employee training programs using metaverse technology, achieving an annual average operational efficiency improvement of 15-20%.
However, challenges still exist in the metaverse industry. The biggest issues are the lack of consistency in user experience and platform compatibility. Currently, major metaverse platforms are building independent ecosystems, causing inconvenience for users who must create new avatars and digital assets each time they switch platforms. To address this, the ‘Universal Avatar Protocol’ announced by the Metaverse Standards Forum at the end of 2025 is gaining attention, with major companies like Meta, Microsoft, and NVIDIA participating.
Privacy protection and cybersecurity are also emerging as critical issues. In the metaverse environment, significantly more personal information is collected, such as user behavior patterns, gaze tracking, and voice data, compared to traditional digital platforms. The European Union (EU) plans to implement strengthened privacy regulations for metaverse platforms starting in March 2026, which will likely impose substantial regulatory compliance costs on major platforms. Meta has already spent $3.4 billion on privacy protection-related investments in 2025, with this amount expected to increase to $5 billion in 2026.
The future growth drivers of the metaverse market depend on the proliferation of 5G and 6G networks, advancements in cloud computing technology, and the miniaturization of wearable devices. Particularly, the 6G network, scheduled for commercialization in the second half of 2026, will offer ultra-low latency of under 1ms and transmission speeds exceeding 100Gbps, enabling a much more immersive metaverse experience than currently possible. Along with these technological advancements, the metaverse is expected to evolve beyond simple virtual reality into a ‘phygital’ environment fully integrated with the physical world, creating new business models and investment opportunities.
This analysis is intended for general informational purposes only and is not a solicitation or recommendation for investment. Investment decisions should be made at the individual’s discretion and responsibility.
