Meta is planning to reduce its virtual asset sales by approximately 50% in its metaverse.

• The 47.5% figure represents the total cost, including a 30% hardware platform fee for sales made through the Meta Quest Store, which sells apps and games for its virtual reality headsets.
• Horizon Worlds will charge a 17.5% fee on top of the original price.
• The fees Meta charges for virtual asset sales on Horizon Worlds are higher than the 30% Apple charges developers on its App Store.

Facebook-parent plans to take a cut of up to 47.5% on the sale of digital assets on its virtual reality platform Horizon Worlds, which is a key component of the company's plan to create a "metaverse."

Meta, the social media giant, announced in a blogpost Monday that it is allowing a select group of Horizon Worlds creators to sell virtual assets within the worlds they create, which could potentially involve NFTs. However, the company did not specify in the post how much Meta will charge creators for selling their products.

Meta has announced that it will take a maximum of 47.5% cut on each transaction, including a 30% hardware platform fee for sales made through the Meta Quest Store and a 17.5% fee for Horizon Worlds.

Some members of the NFT community are furious about the size of the cut that Facebook, now known as Meta, has taken from their sales. One Twitter user expressed their anger by writing: "I hate you Facebook," while another said: "If Meta wants 47.5% of NFT sales, they need to talk to the IRS because I don't even have that after taxes."

While OpenSea charges a 2.5% transaction fee, LooksRare only takes a 2% cut.

In recent months, companies and individuals have been purchasing various items, including art and real estate, in virtual worlds through platforms such as Decentraland and The Sandbox. Notably, Snoop Dogg has acquired virtual land and a fan spent $450,000 in December to purchase a plot adjacent to him on The Sandbox.

According to The Verge, Meta's VP of Horizon, Vivek Sharma, stated that the company believes their rate is competitive in the market and that other platforms should also have a share.

The virtual reality game Horizon Worlds, previously known as Facebook Horizon, is accessible for free and enables users to construct and explore virtual realms. Meta released the game on its Oculus VR headsets in the U.S. and Canada on December 9th, but it has not been made available globally yet.

Meta vs. Apple

The fees Meta charges for the sale of virtual assets on Horizon Worlds are significantly higher than the fees it charges developers on its App Store.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other Meta executives have previously criticized Apple for imposing a 30% fee on developers for in-app purchases through the App Store.

In November, Zuckerberg announced that his company aimed to assist metaverse creators in avoiding Apple's App Store fee.

Our focus on the metaverse involves opening up revenue streams for creators through our updated subscriptions product, which reduces the 30% fees that Apple charges on transactions, allowing creators to earn more.

The charge will apply to all virtual assets within Horizon World.