using Marvelous Designer (picture taken Oct. 10th, 2019)
UPDATE April 8th, 2024: For an updated and expanded comparison chart of the features of fifteen social VR platforms, please click here. I hope to expand this spreadsheet over time, adding new social VR platforms to it from this longer list.
I will be keeping this list of virtual worlds, social VR apps, and metaverse platforms up-to-date as I cover both old and new products, as a sort of comprehensive index to my website (you can find definitions of these terms here).
There are three categories of metaverse platforms which I will not endeavour to cover on this list:
- Products aimed at the teen/tween market (mostly on mobile devices, e.g. IMVU, Avakin Life);
- Purely sexually oriented or “adult” virtual worlds and social VR; and
- Platforms incorporating blockchain, cryptocurrencies, or Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs). e.g. Decentraland, Somnium Space.
I have discovered another list (and an accompanying detailed infographic) by a consulting company called Metaversed, called The Metaverse Directory: Virtual Worlds from A to Z (2022). This list includes blockchain-based virtual worlds and social VR platforms. More information here.
You might also be interested in my list of non-combat, open-world exploration and/or puzzle and/or life simulation games. For example, Fortnite launched Party Royale Island, an open-ended, non-combat extension to the phenomenally popular online game, as a means for gamers to socialize and a venue for concerts.
Flatscreen (Non-VR/AR) Virtual Worlds
- Active Worlds (the granddaddy of all graphical virtual worlds, launched on June 28th, 1995, and now thirty-one years old as of 2026!)
- Atom Universe
- AvaCon
- AviLife (not yet available)
- Beloola
- Blue Mars (now closed)
- Cloud Party (officially closed in 2014 after they were bought out by Yahoo!)
- Core
- Dreams (a game and world-building platform for PlayStation)
- Dual Universe (I would classify this as an MMO/MMORPG instead of a virtual world)
- Ever, Jane
- Gather (a 2D virtual world with video and audio capabilties)
- InWorldz (This grid closed on July 27th, 2018.)
- Islandz Virtual World (the successor to InWorldz; closed in February 2019)
- Jel
- Kitely (an OpenSim grid)
- LivCloser
- New Art City
- Occupy White Walls
- Online Town (a 2D virtual world with video and audio)
- OpenSim based virtual worlds (e.g. OSGrid); here’s a list of active OpenSim grids
- Playable Worlds
- Relm (a browser-based virtual world for support groups, team meetings, and life coaches)
- Remotely
- ROND
- Roomkey (formerly called Teooh)
- RP1 (a business-to-business service offering shardless scalability to other metaverse projects)
- Second Life (Now 23 years old, and still among the most commercially successful and popular virtual worlds to date, with approximately 900,000 regular monthly users during the recent coronavirus pandemic)
- Seed (an MMORPG/virtual world hybrid)
- Skittish
- Spinview
- Teemew
- There.com
- Threedium
- Twinity
- Virtual Paradise
Social VR/AR Platforms
PLEASE NOTE: Platforms marked with an asterisk (*) support users in VR headsets. Please note that in some cases, VR support is experimental or still in beta. Platforms marked with a dagger (†) are those still-rare platforms which support users in augmented reality (AR) headsets, such as the Microsoft Hololens, the Magic Leap One, or the brand-new Apple Vision Pro. Please note that I do not consider cellphone-based “AR” (e.g. Pokémon Go) to be true augmented reality.
- Aardvark*
- Acadicus*
- Alcove VR*
- Alloverse* (not yet available)
- AltspaceVR* (UPDATE Feb. 6th, 2023: AltspaceVR shut down on March 10th, 2023.)
- Anarchy Arcade*
- Anyland*
- Apertus VR*
- Art Gate*
- Arthur*
- Avatar Chat† (formerly called Social; the first social augmented reality app, for the Magic Leap One headset)
- Bean VR* (which appears to have closed down)
- Bigscreen*
- Breakroom* (by Sinespace)
- Capsa*
- Cheerio*
- ChilloutVR*
- Cisco Spark in VR* (Cisco shut down this project in October 2018)
- Cluster*
- Community Garden* (now closed; as of Oct. 30th, 2018, this platform has been merged into Somnium Space)
- Dance Central*
- Dimension10*
- Districts* (not yet available, as far as I can tell)
- DiveReal*
- Dream*
- Edorble*
- Elysium VR* (not yet available)
- EmbodyMe*
- Endless Riff*
- ENGAGE*
- EpicLive* (not yet available)
- Eventual VR*
- The Expanse*
- Facebook Spaces* (which closed on October 25th, 2019)
- Flowtropolis* (not yet available)
- ForeVR*
- FRAME*, by VirBELA
- Fundamental Surgery* by FundamentalVR, a surgical training platform
- Galaxity*
- Geekzonia* (which appears to have closed down)
- Glue*
- Guru Gedara*
- Half + Half*
- Helios*
- HEMOSY and Project Polis* (still in very early development)
- High Fidelity* (the pioneering social VR platform, which shut down on Jan. 15th, 2020; please note that the New High Fidelity is a completely separate product, a 2D space with 3D audio, which launched on May 22nd, 2020, and has been implemented on a number of metaverse platforms)
- Hoppin’*
- Horizon Venues* (formerly called Oculus Venues; for Gear VR, Oculus Go, and Oculus Quest users)
- Horizon Workrooms*, a collaborative VR platform for remote workteams launched by Facebook on August 19th, 2021, for the Quest 2 (shut down in 2026)
- Horizon Worlds* (formerly known as Facebook Horizon; now open to the public aged 18+ in Canada and the United States; almost completely shut down in 2026)
- Hypatia*
- Hyperfair VR*
- Immersed*
- Inlight Spark*
- UPDATE April 26tth, 2024: InnerWorld* (formerly known as Help Club, or Very Real Help; this is a social VR platform for peer-based mental health and addiction intervention and support, using Cognitive Behavioural Therapy)
- InsiteVR*
- UPDATE April 8th, 2024: InSpaze† (a social app for the Apple Vision Pro headset)
- Lavender*
- LearnBrite*
- LiveLike*
- Manova* by XRSpace
- MasterpieceVR*
- meetingRoom*
- MeetinVR*
- Metrix VR*
- Mozilla Hubs* (Note: Hubs will shut down on May 31st, 2024, but there is an open-source community edition available; more information here.)
- Museum of Other Realities*
- Nanome* (a social VR platform for molecular design in chemistry)
- Neutrans*
- NOYS VR*
- Oasis* (a Chinese platform akin to VRChat)
- Oculus Home*
- Oculus Rooms* (which closed on October 25th, 2019)
- Overte* (a free and open source social VR platform based on the original High Fidelity source code)
- Oxford Medical Simulation*
- Pararea*
- Planet Theta* (not yet available)
- Pluto VR*
- PokerStars VR*
- Prospect*
- Raspberry Dream Land* (currently invite-only)
- Rec Room*
- Redpill VR*
- REMIO* (a full-service social VR company for business)
- Riff XR*
- Roblox*
- Rumii*
- Sansar* (a social VR platform developed by Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life; recently sold to Wookey, the platform has pivoted to focus on live events)
- SapphireXR*
- ScienceVR* (offering web-based social VR on science and literature topics)
- SculptrVR*
- Sinespace* (a Unity-based virtual world that supports VR; shut down, but a spinoff platform continues)
- Spatial*† (a social augmented reality/virtual reality app for work collaboration)
- Spatiate† (a social augmented reality app for art creation)
- STAGE*
- Stageverse*
- STYLY*
- SurrealVR*
- Teleporter*
- Tivoli Cloud VR* (a fork of the open-source High Fidelity software code, which closed in February 2022)
- Topik*
- UXR.ZONE*
- VirBELA*
- Vircadia* (formerly known as Project Athena, a fork of the open-source High Fidelity software code; )
- Viveport Verse*
- Vizible*
- VR Conference* by Mixtive and Telia
- VR Triber*
- VR Trivia Battle* (formerly known as Kiss or Kill)
- VRAVO!*
- VRChat*
- VRLand*
- vSpatial*
- vTime XR* (formerly known as just vTime)
- Wave* (formerly known as TheWaveVR)
- The Wild*
- Wonda VR*
Well, I figure this is pretty much the canonical listing of social VR/virtual world platforms. Have I missed any? It’s like Pokémon, “gotta catch ’em all”…if you have heard of one that I haven’t covered yet, please let me know via the Contact page of my blog, thanks!
