Develop OpenXR native PC apps without a headset by using Meta XR Simulator

If you don't have an XR headset but you want to develop OpenXR apps, you can use Meta XR Simulator! It's great.

Download Meta XR Simulator

Download Meta XR Simulator

Download it from here

You will get a compressed file, and you have to extract it and get the necessary files.

We only need the MetaXRSimulator folder. Copy it to somewhere on your machine, for example, C:\MetaXRSimulator.

Configure Currently Active OpenXR Runtime & Run

There are two options to configure the currently active OpenXR runtime on Windows:

• Windows Registry
• Environment Variable

I recommend you to use an temporary environment variable (XR_RUNTIME_JSON) in the IDE or the terminal to set the currently active OpenXR runtime, which will not replace the system default OpenXR runtime.

Powershell

$Env:XR_RUNTIME_JSON = "C:\MetaXRSimulator\meta_openxr_simulator.json"
# then run your OpenXR apps

CMD

set XR_RUNTIME_JSON="C:\MetaXRSimulator\meta_openxr_simulator.json"
:: then run your OpenXR apps

After configuring the environment variable, just run your OpenXR apps in the same terminal!

Have fun!