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Palmer Luckey Built the First Oculus Headset at 16 With $100 eBay Parts

By Palmer Luckey · Founding Stories · 2 min read

Medical facilities were shutting down. They had VR headsets that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Luckey was buying them on eBay for less than $100. He was probably the only guy in the world collecting them.

Key Points

He started working on VR at 15 — reading old patents, military research papers, and academic studies
His first prototype weighed 6-7 pounds but proved the visual experience was way better than a monitor
He launched Oculus only after friends stopped saying 'I don't get it' and started saying 'holy shit'

I'm buying stuff that they bought for literally hundreds of thousands of dollars for less than $100.

Downloading Everything About VR

Luckey: I started working on VR when I was 15 years old. It took me a while to learn — I read a whole bunch of old patents from the '80s and '90s, academic studies about VR, military research papers. I was just downloading into my brain everything I could about what worked and what didn't.

I was also buying a lot of old hardware. Back then, old VR headsets were dirt cheap because nobody was collecting them. I was probably the only guy in the whole world. Medical facilities shutting down — I'm buying stuff they paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for, for less than $100.

Old VR headsets were dirt cheap. I was probably the only guy in the world collecting them.

Prototype One

Luckey: I built my first prototype headset when I was 16. I called it PR1 — prototype one. It was a wide field-of-view virtual reality headset, 3D compatible. But it also weighed six or seven pounds. So uncomfortable. So ungainly.

But it was the first thing that proved the visual side is clearly way better than gaming on a monitor. So I kept working on it, building new prototypes.

PR1 weighed seven pounds and was ungainly. But it proved the visual side was way better than a monitor.

Nobody Got It

Luckey: I had been showing prototypes to my friends for years. They all thought I was kind of off my rocker. I wish I could say my friends were supportive — but they're not. Every prototype I'd shown them was honestly not very inspiring unless you had a really good imagination.

I wish I could say my friends were supportive. But they're not. They thought I was off my rocker.

Holy Shit, I Finally Get It

Luckey: When I was 18 — almost 3 years later — I showed people a new prototype. It was the first one where they said 'oh, I finally get it.' Instead of 'I don't get it,' they said 'holy shit, I finally get that this is going somewhere.' That's when I started Oculus.

We did a Kickstarter. Hit our goal in like 2 hours. Built this incredible headset, worked with game developers, got it all out there. And in the long run, ended up selling that to Facebook for a few billion dollars. That's where I got my money.

They stopped saying 'I don't get it.' They said 'holy shit, this is going somewhere.' That's when I started Oculus.