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 virtual worlds, launched on June 28th, 1995, and now twenty-eight years old!)
- 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 over twenty 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
- Horizon Worlds* (formerly known as Facebook Horizon; now open to the public aged 18+ in Canada and the United States)
- 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)
- 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!
