Movies on a plane or train with Apple Vision Pro in Travel Mode

Apple designed the Vision Pro so that you can watch movies on planes. The control center on the Apple Vision Pro contains a special Travel Mode. When enabled, the Vision Pro  keeps a window in place even though you are moving. I was curious how this would work, so when I was on two planes on Friday and a train on Saturday, I finished watching the 3D version of Avatar: The Way of Water on Disney+. There were lots of hiccups, unsurprising for technology that is so new, and the process of getting started can be awkward. But once you are up and running, this is an unparalleled way to watch a movie when traveling. It is truly awesome.

Preparing for your trip

Let’s start with what you likely already know. If you want to watch movies on a Vision Pro on the airplane, you need to download them beforehand. On Disney+, 3D movies tend to take between 10 GB and, in the case of the Avatar movie I watched, almost 25 GB.  So if you have the least expensive model of the Vision Pro with 256 GB, there is only so much that you can download before your trip.

Physical Space before Virtual Space

So now your are on the plane. Let’s start with the bad news. No matter where you are—on your couch or in an airplane—you need a certain amount of space to put on an Apple Vision Pro. I keep mine in the case that Apple sells, so I need space to open up that case and set it down. Then I need to take out the battery and put it to my side. Then I need to remove the Vision Pro. Then I need to remove the protective cover from the front of the Vision Pro. I typically put that cover back in the case and put my eyeglasses in the cover. Next you need to attach the cord to the side of the Vision Pro and turn it on. There is a certain ritual to turning on an Apple Vision Pro, and to do it carefully so that you don’t accidentally drop any of this expensive equipment, you need some space.

I was on two flights on Friday, both times sitting in the aisle seat in the main cabin. By some miracle, both times I had nobody in the middle seat next to me. How rare is that? Because there was nobody next to me, I had plenty of space to use that seat to put my case there and get my Vision Pro ready to use. But you certainly cannot count on that luxury.

If I had a friend or family member sitting next to me, I suppose I could have asked them to hold items as I got everything connected. But if it was a stranger next to me—or on both sides if I was in a middle seat—it would have been very awkward to put on the Vision Pro. I didn’t travel in First Class this past Friday, but I suspect that in First Class you would have enough room to put on a Vision Pro.

Think about this carefully before you get your heart set on using a Vision Pro on a plane. If I was traveling by myself and had someone sitting next to me, that would probably deter me from using a Vision Pro on a plane.

Environments?

When you use a Vision Pro, you can either opt to see the real world around you or you can put yourself in an environment, replacing the outside world with a pleasant setting.

On the one hand, using an Environment could help to mask the fact that you are in such a cramp seat on the plane. Indeed, everything that I just said above about how you need space in the physical world to put on a Vision Pro is just the opposite once you are in the virtual world. It has never been easier to block out the outside world and pretend like you are alone. While wearing a Vision Pro and dialling in an Environment, you can probably even forget that you are sitting in a middle seat.

On the other hand, there is an advantage to seeing the outside world while you watch a movie. Both flights that I took on Friday were short flights of around two hours or less. There were announcements and there were crew members walking up and down the aisle. Sitting in an aisle seat, I preferred keeping one eye on the outside world as I enjoyed my movie.

I took a screenshot while I was watchiing the Avatar movie and had turned to look at the aisle. When you take a screenshot, Apple replaces the image of the movie with a black screen becuase of Digital Rights Management, so that is why you see a big black box below. As you can see, my movie screen was considerably larger than the ones on the backs of the seats around me.

Speaking of the outside world, nobody on the plane said anything to me about wearing a Vision Pro, except for my son who was in the aisle seat across from me and who rolled his eyes at me. However, on both flights, the flight attendants definitely noticed. On my first flight, one of them chuckled at me and pointed me out to another flight attendant; I’m not sure if she realized that I was looking right at her. On the second flight, the flight attendant understood that I could see her and asked me lots of questions about how it worked, what I was watching etc. 

The movie watching experience

If you have the space to put on an Apple Vision Pro during a flight, it is a truly incredible way to watch a movie. Your Vision Pro will immediately sense that you are on an airplane and will offer to put you in Travel Mode. That is necessary to help the Vision Pro to keep windows in place and account for the shaking of the flight.

Once you are in Travel Mode, you can start watching a movie. And the movie looked amazing—just as good as when I started watching Avatar at home. The screen was huge and bright, the 3D effects were incredible, the sound (using my Air Pods Pro) was amazing. Except for the fact that I was also vaguely paying attention to people coming down the aisle of the airplane, I was totally immersed in the movie. There is no question that a Vision Pro is the best way to watch a movie by yourself, and this remains true when you are on a plane. It was awesome.

There were also a few hiccups, but they were relatively minor. As long as I kept watching the movie, the movie worked great. But if I looked to the let or right, the Vision Pro would get confused, even though I was in Travel Mode, and gave me a warning that Tracking Failed. As soon as I turned back to the movie, that error message disappeared.

Also, I found that while in Travel Mode, controlling the screen with my eyes was a little less precise. Most of the time, I was just watching the movie so I didn’t need to control anything. But when I dd need to do something, I sometimes had trouble selecting something so that I could click it, so I would often have to look away and then look back at it to get it selected. It was only a minor annoyance, but I hope that this is something that Apple can adjust in a software update.

On a train

Apple’s website only talks about using the Vision Pro while you are on a plane, but on Saturday when I was a commuter rail train, as soon as I put on my Vision Pro I got the same message about enabling Travel Mode—I presume because the Vision Pro sensed that I was moving. I turned Tavel Mode on, and everything worked just like on the plane.

I didn’t try this myself, but I’ve heard other people report that if you don’t turn on Travel Mode on a train, and if you put a window in a location while you are at a station, as the train leaves the station you will see your window quickly disappear behind you as it stays in one location but you move forward. That’s not useful, but it is sort of funny.

One nice advantage of using a Vision Pro on a train is space. In my experience, I am far more likely to get ample space around myself on a train. Thus, the limited physical space problem of a plane may be a non-issue for you on a train.

I did find that I got a few more error messages on the train. For example, two different times, my AirPods Pro were disconnected and I had to go to the Settings app to connect them again. I don’t know why.

Tear-jerkers and the Vision Pro

As I finished the Avatar movie on the train, I encountered a new issue that had never occurred to me before: tears. I’ll admit that when film directors do something in a movie to tug in my heartstrings, I am the sort of person who will often tear up. And at the end of the Avatar movie when there were some nice moments between the family, I found myself tearing up a little. So of course I moved my hand to my eye to wipe the tears, only to discover that you cannot do that while wearing a Vision Pro. Instead, my teardrops dripped downt to the Light Seal cushion, where they were promptly absorbed. Does this mean that if I watch too many tear-jerkers with my Vision Pro, I’m going to need to start washing my Light Seal? That’s not something that I had thought about before.

Conclusion

There were a few hiccups along the way, but I’m sure that these will be ironed out. And needing space to put on a Vision Pro is unfortunate. But when it comes to the experience of watching a movie on a plane or a train, there is nothing like the Vision Pro. If I was on a long cross-country or international flight where I wanted to eat up many hours by watching movies, the Vision Pro would be amazing for that. You just need to get over the problem of having enough space around you to put it on and off. That’s not a minor issue, and it will probably deter me from using a Vision Pro on many flights unless I know that I am upgraded to First Class or have some other reason not to worry about space.