Somnium Space

Somnium Space
Information
Industry	Virtual Reality
Founded	2017
Founder	Artur Sychov
Headquarters	Czech Republic
Notable Personnel	Artur Sychov (Founder and CEO)
Products	Social VR platform, Somnium VR1 PC VR headset
Website	https://somniumspace.com

Somnium Space is a Czech Virtual Reality company that operates an open, persistent, blockchain-based social VR platform of the same name and, since 2024, manufactures the Somnium VR1 PC VR headset. The company was founded in 2017 by Artur Sychov, who remains its chief executive, and is based in the Czech Republic. The social platform launched to the public in September 2018 and lets users buy virtual land, build structures, run businesses, and host events, with the underlying assets recorded as tokens on the Ethereum blockchain.

History

Somnium Space was started in 2017 by Artur Sychov, a former investment trader who had spent years in online virtual worlds beginning with Ultima Online and Second Life. He set out to build a decentralized Metaverse in which the economy and ownership of in-world assets would sit on a public blockchain rather than be controlled by a single operator. The platform opened to the public in September 2018.

In its early years the company sold virtual land as non-fungible tokens through two events it called Initial Land Offerings, both held on the OpenSea marketplace, with each parcel required before a user could build an independent world. The platform's economy is denominated in an Ethereum ERC-20 utility token called Somnium CUBE, capped at a maximum supply of 100 million tokens, which is used to buy land, avatars, and other items. Somnium later extended its NFT support beyond Ethereum, adding Solana and signalling further multi-chain integration so that assets minted on different chains could be displayed inside its land parcels.

In May 2022 Somnium Space led a 4 million US dollar Series A funding round in Lynx, a French mixed reality headset maker, and Sychov joined the Lynx board of directors. Later that year the company turned to building its own hardware.

Somnium VR1 headset

Development of a headset began around 2021, and in September 2022 Somnium Space announced a partnership with two other Czech companies, the enterprise XR maker VRgineers and the 3D-printer manufacturer Prusa Research, to build an open-source PC VR headset then called the Somnium VR One. The project was backed by direct investment into VRgineers by both Somnium Space and Prusa Research, with VRgineers, a firm known for high-resolution enterprise and military training headsets, acting as the hardware partner and manufacturer. The Somnium VR1 is designed, developed, and produced in the Czech Republic.

The VR1 is a tethered, enthusiast-grade PC VR headset. Reservation holders were invited to order from June 20, 2024, and the headset went on general sale on July 12, 2024, the same day Somnium held its Somnium Connect event in Prague. Each eye uses a 2,880 by 2,880 QLED Mini-LED LCD panel with local dimming for a quoted 20,000:1 contrast ratio, paired with aspheric lenses that deliver a 130-degree horizontal by 105-degree vertical field of view. Supported refresh rates are 72, 90, and 120 Hz, with an experimental 144 Hz mode. The headset relies on SteamVR tracking and so needs at least one base station, ideally two, plus external controllers such as the Valve Index Controllers; modular factory options add 120 Hz Eye tracking with Foveated rendering, Ultraleap optical Hand tracking, and twin 12-megapixel passthrough cameras for mixed reality.

The VR1 launched as eight editions ranging from the 1,900 euro Classic to a 3,990 euro limited Translucent edition, with a separate Military edition certified for TAA compliance. On January 16, 2025, Somnium Space raised prices across the lineup by 500 to 700 euros and discontinued four variants, the Classic, Striker, Specter, and Translucent editions, which left the cheapest available model, the eye-tracking Visionary, starting at 2,999 euros, or roughly 3,090 US dollars.

Edition	Eye tracking	Hand tracking	Passthrough	Launch price (2024)	Price after Jan 2025
Classic	No	No	No	1,900 euros	Discontinued
Striker	No	Yes	No	2,300 euros	Discontinued
Visionary	Yes	No	No	2,500 euros	2,999 euros
Titan	Yes	Yes	No	2,900 euros	3,399 euros
Specter	No	Yes	Yes	3,100 euros	Discontinued
Ultimate	Yes	Yes	Yes	3,500 euros	4,299 euros
Translucent (limited)	Yes	Yes	Yes	3,990 euros	Discontinued
Military (TAA)	Yes	Yes	Yes	Not disclosed	Not disclosed

Live Forever mode

Somnium Space drew wider mainstream attention for a planned feature it calls Live Forever mode, announced in April 2022. The idea is to record a user's movements, voice, and conversational patterns in VR and use artificial intelligence to generate an avatar that can keep moving, talking, and reacting like that person after they have died. Sychov has said the concept was inspired by his father's illness and his wish that his children could one day talk with a digital version of their grandfather. The company described the feature as opt-in and off by default. The concept was covered by outlets including Vice and NPR as an early example of attempts at digital immortality.

Platform and technology

The Somnium Space platform is an open, persistent, social VR world in which a finite supply of virtual land parcels is owned by users as NFTs. Owners can build on their land, host events and businesses, and trade parcels, avatars, and items, with transactions settled in the CUBE token. The platform is accessible in Virtual Reality as well as on desktop, and the company has positioned decentralization and user ownership as core to its vision of the metaverse. With the launch of the Somnium VR1, Somnium became one of the few metaverse-focused companies to also ship its own high-end PC VR hardware.