BOXVR

BOXVR
Information
VR/AR	VR
Developer	FitXR (credited as FITAR at the 2017 Early Access launch)
Publisher	FitXR; Perp Games (2019 PlayStation 4 retail edition)
Platform	SteamVR, Oculus, PlayStation 4
Device	HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, Windows Mixed Reality, PlayStation VR, Oculus Quest (replaced by FitXR in 2020)
Operating System	Windows
Type	Full Game
Genre	Indie, Sports, VR
Input Device	Tracked Motion Controllers, PlayStation Move
Play Area	Standing, Room-Scale
Game Mode	Single Player, Multiplayer
Language	English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Dutch, Japanese, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese
Review	Mostly Positive (Steam user reviews, October 2026)
Release Date	Jun 13, 2017 (Steam Early Access); January 18, 2018 (Oculus Store); April 30, 2019 (PlayStation VR); May 21, 2019 (full release on Steam and Oculus Quest)
Price	$29.99 (Steam, 2026); $19.99 during Early Access
App Store	Steam, Oculus Store, PlayStation Store
Website	https://fitxr.com/
Infobox Updated	10/09/2026

BOXVR (also styled BoxVR) is a virtual reality fitness game in which the player punches targets, blocks, ducks and squats in time with music during boxing workouts choreographed by fitness instructors. It was developed by FitXR, which was credited as FITAR when the game entered Steam Early Access for the HTC Vive on 13 June 2017. The game later came to the Oculus Rift (January 2018), PlayStation VR (30 April 2019) and the Oculus Quest, where it was a launch title on 21 May 2019, the same day the Steam version left Early Access.

On the Quest, BOXVR was replaced on 30 July 2020 by a rebuilt app named FitXR, given free to existing owners. The PC and PlayStation VR versions kept the BOXVR name. FitXR's help centre says BoxVR is no longer in active development, and the Steam version is still sold as of October 2026.

Reviewed 9 October 2026. Checked every date, number, price, platform, review score and attribution against the cited Steam store and news posts (via Steam API), archived 2017 Steam page, FitXR history and help centre, PlayStation Blog, UploadVR, Road to VR, VR Fitness Insider, Collider, TechCrunch, GameTyrant, Metacritic, OpenCritic, PSU and TheSixthAxis. About review dates.

Gameplay

Workouts are choreographed to music by fitness instructors. Coloured targets fly toward the player on the beat, and their colour shows which hand and which punch (jab, hook or uppercut) to throw, while barriers make the player duck, weave, block or squat. A PlayStation Blog post by FitXR's head of fitness, Ianthe Mellors, described the result as "kind of a mash-up of Guitar Hero and Zumba". Points are added according to how fast the player throws each punch. In October 2018 Road to VR described workouts ranging from three-minute warm-ups to endurance sessions of more than 20 minutes. The PlayStation VR version advertised sessions of six to 60 minutes, with routines that build in intensity and include rest periods for recovery.

The game records every session and shows an estimate of calories burned, with totals by session, week, month and all time. A "dynamic" calorie counter added in February 2018 estimates the burn from arm and body movement, calibrated to the player's weight. Players can create several user profiles, set daily exercise goals and follow their progress on graphs. Workouts that involve squats and leg work can be filtered out, which lets wheelchair users and people with limited mobility play.

In the Training mode, later renamed My Workouts, players build their own sessions. It first accepted the player's MP3 and WAV files with on-the-fly beat detection at three difficulty levels; AAC files were supported from April 2018, and from the full release all of the game's own tracks could also be placed in custom playlists. The current Steam listing calls this a Workout Generator that analyses the player's music to create workouts. Multiplayer lobbies for up to six players, used for group workouts or high-score matches, were added in April 2018. The Steam and Oculus versions had a Survival mode, which FitXR left out of the PlayStation VR release because it considered an endless mode a risk of over-exertion.

VR hardware and play area

On PC the game requires a SteamVR headset with tracked motion controllers and is played standing or at room scale. The Early Access launch supported only the HTC Vive. Oculus Rift support was added to the Steam version on 10 October 2017, in the same update that let players rotate the controller inside the virtual gloves to suit their grip. Road to VR listed the Steam version as playable on Rift, Vive and Windows Mixed Reality headsets in October 2018. The PlayStation VR version requires PlayStation Move controllers. On Oculus platforms the game supported cross-buy between Rift and Quest.

Development

Sam Cole and Sameer Baroova founded FitXR in a garden shed in Woking in October 2016, and the company released BOXVR in Steam Early Access in June 2017 after several months of prototyping. In a 2020 interview with Collider, Cole said the founders were bootstrapping with a few freelance developers, sold the Early Access game for about $20 and put that early revenue back into development. He also said the team had been "completely blown away" by the support the game received from Steam's gaming audience.

The 2017 Early Access build had five workouts and a tutorial. The developer then expected Early Access to last one to three months and planned more workouts, instructor voice-overs, dynamic scoring based on punch performance, a Training mode and a Survival mode. In practice the game stayed in Early Access for almost two years. Updates in that period removed jumping moves after player feedback, added support for ten more interface languages (January 2018), the dynamic calorie counter (February 2018), profiles, playlists and multiplayer (April 2018), and a futuristic environment with redesigned punch cues and two beginner workouts (May 2018).

FitXR says BOXVR passed 10,000 downloads in February 2018 and 30,000 in July 2018. In November 2018 the company raised a $1.25 million seed round from Boost VC, Maveron, TenOneTen and several individual investors; VR Fitness Insider reported that the game then had nearly 50,000 paying users and had sold without marketing support.

The version made for PlayStation VR, whose workouts were designed by six fitness instructors including Mellors, became the basis of the full release. It brought the total to 45 routines (11 of them new) and 110 music tracks, more than double the earlier track count, and added trophies. When the PC version left Early Access on 21 May 2019 it received the same content: 15 more workouts for a total of 45, "Active Rests" that lower the intensity for a while in place of full rest periods, a new locker-room menu, Day Gym, Night Gym and Future environments, 110 tracks, and access to every workout in multiplayer. A free update on 17 December 2019 added 12 workouts and more than 40 tracks chosen by community vote. Two paid add-ons followed on 23 April 2020: the Essentials Pack, with an hour of new workouts, and the Extreme Pack, with advanced workouts set to 18 new tracks.

Release

Platform	Date	Notes
Steam (HTC Vive)	13 June 2017	Early Access, US$19.99; Vive only at launch
Steam (Oculus Rift)	10 October 2017	Rift support added in update v0.2.10
Oculus Store (Oculus Rift)	18 January 2018	Release on Oculus's own store
PlayStation Store (PlayStation VR)	30 April 2019	US$29.99; 45 routines and 110 tracks
Steam	21 May 2019	Left Early Access with the PlayStation VR content
Oculus Store (Oculus Quest)	21 May 2019	Quest launch title, US$29.99 or £24.99
PlayStation 4 retail disc (PlayStation VR)	25 October 2019	North American physical edition published by Perp Games
Oculus Quest	30 July 2020	Replaced by FitXR as a free update for owners; US$29.99 otherwise

FitXR held free weekends for the game on the Oculus Store for Rift from 3 to 7 May 2018, and on both Steam and the Oculus Store from 5 to 8 October 2018, when its regular price was about $20. By July 2020 BOXVR was sold for $29.99 on the Oculus Store, PlayStation Store and Steam, with $9.99 content packs. As of October 2026 the Steam store lists the game at US$29.99 and both add-on packs at US$9.99 each.

Reception

VR Fitness Insider named BOXVR its 2017 Fitness Title of the Year while the game was still in Early Access. In May 2018 Road to VR reported a 4/5 star rating on the Oculus Store and 98% positive Steam user reviews. As of October 2026, Steam user reviews are rated "Mostly Positive" across 1,626 reviews.

The PlayStation 4 version has a Metacritic score of 81 ("generally favorable") from five critic reviews. OpenCritic lists a Top Critic Average of 81, with 90% of critics recommending the game. PlayStation Universe gave the PlayStation VR version 8.5 out of 10, calling it more intense than other PlayStation VR fitness games and "hugely responsive" in its use of head tracking. It described the presentation as "conservative and functional", criticised the choice of only three workout locations, and said multiplayer did not appear to work at the time of review. TheSixthAxis reviewed the Quest version in March 2020 and gave it 8 out of 10, praising the range of routines and the music. Its reviewer noted sweat building up in the headset during long sessions, said punch technique had to be adjusted to suit the tracking, and wanted warm-up and cool-down routines.

Transition to FitXR

In July 2020 FitXR announced a $7.5 million Series A round led by Hiro Capital and relaunched its Quest app as a "virtual gym" built on an updated BOXVR. The FitXR update kept the core punch-to-the-beat gameplay but rewrote the rest. It added a new virtual gym and interface, made side jabs and uppercuts easier to hit, and let BoxVR add-on content carry over. In its review of FitXR, UploadVR said the update removed BOXVR's custom playlists, cut the choice of three environments down to one, and replaced live multiplayer with recorded "ghost data" of other players.

FitXR said at the time that it was working on FitXR versions for PlayStation VR and SteamVR. Those versions were not released. FitXR's help centre says BoxVR became increasingly unstable, which led the company to build FitXR in 2020, and that hardware limits on PlayStation VR and staffing limits for SteamVR prevented releasing the new app on those platforms. According to the same page, last updated in May 2023, BoxVR is no longer in active development but is still sold on Steam and the PlayStation Store. The later app is covered in FitXR.

Features

• Single-player
• Steam Leaderboards

System Requirements

Windows

Minimum

• OS: Windows 7 SP1 or newer
• Processor: Intel® i5-4590 / AMD FX 8350 equivalent or greater
• Memory: 4 GB RAM
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 970 / AMD Radeon™ R9 290 equivalent or greater
• Storage: 900 MB available space
• VR Support: SteamVR. Standing or Room Scale

See also

• FitXR
• VR Fitness
• Beat Saber