These fulltime VR creators show Horizon Worlds isn’t just for kids

A lot of people will be getting their first taste of virtual reality over the holidays this year — and some might even find a new source of income.

The recent release of the Meta Quest 3S has increased the accessibility of self-contained VR/AR headsets with its comparatively low price point of under $300.

Some of those new users will click on the Horizon Worlds app that’s built into every Quest, travel virtually to one of its thousands of environments, encounter some unruly kids and declare the app worthless, leaving never to return. It’s a pattern seen on Reddit’s many forums devoted to the Quest, Horizon Worlds and VR. 

Part of the issue may be that people tend to see immersive worlds as something to be simply consumed, rather than a place that is built on creators. But it’s closer to a social media site like YouTube than to a gaming platform like Playstation, and like the former, it has creators who are not employed by the platform who make a living on it. 

Similar to YouTube, creators can monetize worlds, a feature that opened up to all creators in 2024. It’s one of several ways creators can make money, including contracting with brands, consulting and selling virtual items in-world.

“Between the Quest 3S and the monetize program, I think we’ll see a lot more creators and more Worlds,” Melissa Genao, a Worlds creator known as PigeonNo12, told Technical.ly.

Diverse community building that brands want to pay for

It’s only been three years since virtual reality users were invited by Meta to help build its version of the “metaverse,” defined loosely as interoperable immersive spaces where people interact in real time. 

In 2022, several immersive entrepreneurs, including Genao, told Technical.ly how quickly people — some with little to no coding experience — quit their jobs and supported themselves as Worlds creators. 

Two years later, heading into 2025, most are still going strong, and more have come along, despite Worlds’ enduring reputation as a “ghost town.” 

Worlds isn’t alone in this space. There are multiple virtual and augmented reality devices and platforms out there. VRChat and Roblox are two popular immersive social apps also available on Quest, but with Worlds, creation is done all within the headset rather than with outside software like Unity.

While gaming headsets like the HTC Vive and Valve are compatible with many immersive social apps, the biggest difference between the Quest 3S and gaming devices is that they usually require a gaming PC, while the $299 Quest is an all-in-one wireless headset that’s much less expensive.

Worlds has big, busy games filled with kids, yes. It also has social clubs, bars, live podcasting venues, support groups, cultural events and even churches. There’s a thriving queer community, communities for people with various disabilities, a comedy scene and culture communities that serve the platform’s diverse user base.

Five of the many top creators told their stories on how they make money in Worlds.

Companies hire creators to build VR spaces for them

Most of the people who answered Meta’s call to help build Horizon Worlds in 2021 are regular folks who picked up a VR headset as a hobby, like Genao, who goes by the username PigeonNo12.

Genao was one of the creators who built the Worlds-based healthcare hub HouseCall VR, and as one of the original members of the Meta Horizon Creators Program (MHCP) she has worked full-time as an independent contractor in Worlds since 2022. 

When she first entered Worlds in 2021, she was just looking for people to play chess with. Two years later, in October 2024, she was spotlighted as a featured Worlds creator at Meta Connect.

Genao makes much of her income building Worlds for brands. Just like with websites in the 1990s, there are a lot of companies building themselves spaces in Worlds, and they often prefer to be listed as the creators. One she did mention helping create is CBS’ Survivor: Horizon Island, where players compete in games inspired by the reality show.

Companies hire these creators because it takes a niche skill to build in Worlds.

“What a lot of studios need are the specific Horizon Worlds skills,” Genao told Technical.ly. “They have teams with a lot of experience with Unity, so they will contract with us to help with Horizon’s tools and scripting.” 

Genao is also part of the team that created Fairies in the Trees 2 by SpaceGlitterUnicorn, where visitors are transformed into winged fairness who can bounce on giant mushrooms, fly into the air, catch fireflies and hang out in tiny treehouses.

A self-taught creator makes Worlds his fulltime business

Khaleem Solomon, also known as Hardy West, took a different path as a world creator. The former website designer heard the call to help build the Worlds in 2021, but he wasn’t among the people initially accepted into the MHCP. 

So, after swiping his father’s Quest headset, he taught himself. 

Solomon has made dozens of Worlds including Club90, which became a model for early hip-hop environments. Today, he spends most of his time on his two most successful current online spaces: all-ages RunOut, an Uno-style game made for multiple players, and 18+ Hardy World Spades, a lounge with six spades tables, a dancefloor, stage and cup pong. 

These worlds are his full-time business. About a thousand people visit his space in an average week — strong numbers for an independent world. He sells VIP subscriptions to regulars, digital amenities like deluxe virtual chairs and pointers and, when he can, advertising and occasional worldbuilding projects, including for BallerAlert and R&B singer Raheem DeVaughn.

Even in those early days, Solomon saw the potential for something bigger. He aimed to create a virtual space where adults could connect culturally, hang out, listen to music and play cards.

“I definitely ruffled some feathers,” he said. “At the time, there weren’t really any adult spaces, and there definitely weren’t any spaces of color.”

As one of the few Black Worlds creators at the time, he wanted to make spaces where people like himself would feel they belonged.

His efforts were a success — not only did his Worlds become popular, but he also drew more Black users into Worlds through his social media. As a result, Black-created clubs, art galleries and games have become popular fixtures on the platform. 

Meta doesn’t release demographic data, but, anecdotally, the number of Black-facing communities, especially hip-hop communities, has noticeably increased since 2022, he said. 

“When you come into one of my worlds, you know it was made by us,” Solomon said.

Building worlds to create community, foster mental health

Virtual reality Worlds aren’t just for escapism. Sometimes, they’re places to connect and talk through real-world pain.

Jason and Joy Duncan, the husband-and-wife team behind the “Getting Things Dun” YouTube channel and the “Joy in the Morning” Worlds-based talk show, got into VR when Jason bought up a Quest in 2021. After one try, Joy went out and bought her own the same day.

“That’s when I knew I was going to marry her,” Jason said.

The couple has made a name for themselves among Worlds creators. Their talk show was voted World of the Year and Best Podcast/Talk Show World in 2023 by the Meta Horizon Community. On their YouTube channel, they explore Horizon Worlds, unbox new AR and VR tech and deliver inspirational videos geared toward other tech content creators.

Inspiration is also the mission of Joy in the Morning, a world that starts in a gloomy corridor with walls covered in phrases of self-doubt before visitors move through a door to the bright and sunny talk show-style set. Each episode — the show is currently on hiatus and preparing for its fourth season — features a guest and lots of audience interaction. 

“We want to respect people’s privacy,” Joy said. 

Sometimes, people share deeply personal stories of struggle or overcoming dark times in their lives. Because of that, the audience portions of the show are not streamed publicly. 

Like many creators who have made the pre-metaverse into a business, the Duncans do contract work building Worlds. A favorite project was for Florida State University, where they created a VR replica of the HBCU’s campus.

Production studios boost immersive creator voices 

Dena, who goes by Deenr VR, started using the Quest in 2021, looking for connection after the isolation of the early pandemic. 

“I stumbled into Horizon Worlds by accident and realized these were real people,” she said. “And it freaked me out.”

Eventually, she became comfortable interacting with people in Worlds and started a Facebook group called Horizon Worlds Favorite Worlds to Visit, where she would highlight a different world and its creator each day.

That led to a Meta Creator group, and, eventually, Dena began making in-world movies using Meta Creator Studios.

Dena moved into podcasting via Killer Bee Studios, a World run by Killer Bee Marketing CEO Brian Curee. Her podcast, Creators Spotlight, streams on YouTube and Spotify. Dena also hosted the 2024 Horizon Choice Awards in October. 

Dena has also found community at another of her favorite places in Worlds. She is a board member and teacher and at Living Hope VR Church, which holds weekly Sunday service, Bible study and a live podcast called “New Horizons,” also out of Killer Bee Studios.

VR connections rely on other social sites, too

The immersive world has become a refuge for all kinds, especially those facing marginalization in the real world. Just as Solomon helped build places where Black users can feel safe in Worlds, Mavix, known as Mistermavix, has carved out a popular space for Worlds’ queer community. 

Mavix first bought a VR headset to get into NFTs in the metaverse.

“Jokes on me, because there’s nothing about that here,” he said he told Technical.ly in his event World, Pixel Rooftop, an 18+ lounge with a bar, DJ, pool and games, where it’s always night.

Instead of NFTs, he found a community of like-minded individuals.

“I’m queer myself, and I met a bunch of queer folks in here, and we started gathering once a week just to hang out on Wednesdays.”

That led to the group creating worlds together where they hang out and plan special events for the community.

After a year, Mavix was invited to the MHCP. Combined with his social media marketing career, he’s been able to make a living. Before Worlds, he says, he wasn’t using his computer science degree. 

Now, even though creating 3D modeling wasn’t part of his studies, he’s found that his educational background has helped him learn immersive tools.

Worlds, he said, is not meant to be real life, though it can help create real relationships.

“It’s a new way of having relationships with people,” Mavix said. “When the phone came around before we had cell phones we didn’t say, ‘Oh, I don’t like that, because that’s not real life.’”

Like many niche and cultural community creators, Mistermavix communities on Instagram, Facebook and Discord, where members can plan meetups and events. Knowing a World schedule is important to meet people and hang out, since they’re often empty when nothing is scheduled unless they’re active game worlds like Hardy World Spades. 

Quest newbies wondering how to find worlds like Pixel Rooftop of Hardy World Spades that cater to adults can search “18+”. Adult-oriented worlds are busiest at night, but users are spread across the real world in seven countries, so, with the different time zones, it’s usually night somewhere.

Creators expect continued investment in Horizons Worlds 

With the creator economy continuing to grow, immersive spaces emerge as an opportunity for more monetization. Plus, since it’s a developing space, there’s currently less competition comparatively.

Beyond just Horizon Worlds, another big competitor is poised to join the space, as Samsung and Google plan to launch a new Android-based VR/AR headset in 2025.

Still, the Worlds creator program uniquely supports the current wave of immersive entrepreneurs.

In addition to the new more accessible Quest 3S, Meta has launched Creator Competition, a hackathon for members of the Meta Horizon Creator Program with a $500,000 prize pool. 

The focus of the hackathon may reveal one of Meta’s upcoming priorities: Horizon Worlds mobile, where users can access worlds through their phones. Mobile has been publicly available since late 2023, but its functionality has been spotty so far. 

Despite the mobile push, the creators see the immersive experience as vital to Worlds, though immersive tech beyond a bulky headset is still probably years away. 

Eventually, though, augmented reality will become relatively seamless, they said.

“The future of Worlds is AR,” said Genao, “where you can put things in your own space and interact with people in your own living room.”