Meta’s avatar legs roll out to beta testers, but only in Quest Home

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By Wes Davis, a weekend editor who covers the latest in tech and entertainment. He has written news, reviews, and more as a tech journalist since 2020.

Meta is adding legs to Quest Avatars in Quest Home — but not Horizon Worlds —in a new beta announced last week in the Meta Community forums (via UploadVR). Community manager Ryanality posted in the forums that the “Public Test Channel (PTC) for Quest v57 is starting to roll out for Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2 soon,” though without specifying any new features. Then, yesterday, a forum user named TomCgcmfc reported their avatar had legs.

A post on X (formerly Twitter) from Brad Lynch shows what the legs will look like. For now, beta users can’t see their legs without looking at an in-game mirror, and from the video, it looks like the avatar won’t crouch when the user does so. Although the legs reportedly don’t make an appearance in Horizon Worlds yet, theydo exist in betas for a new mobile and web version of Horizon Worlds, which was rumored last month.

Users in the Meta Community forum also reported updated menus that allow hand tracking to position and use them (rather than needing direct manipulation). On Reddit, one user claimed to see improvements to both hand tracking and auto-switching between controllers and hands. NyaVR on X posted that they found code references to new settings, including an extended battery mode (via Mixed Reality News).

It’s been more than 10 months since Meta announced legs would be coming, with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg saying at Meta Connect that legs are “probably the most requested feature.” Zuckerberg said then that the company would need to use an AI model for leg movement because tracking them with the headset’s cameras is tricky.