NatWest is one of the first banking services providers to launch its app on Apple’s Vision Pro smart goggles.

NatWest’s retail banking app is now available on Apple’s new mixed-reality headset device – Vision Pro. It allows the headset users to access banking services in an innovative spatial way, controlled by intuitive gestures.

Apple Vision Pro is full of new patented technologies. These goggles blend digital content with real-life physical world scenes to unlock unique mixed reality experiences. VisionOS has a three-dimensional user interface. Its input system is controlled entirely by a user’s eyes, hands and voice. To adjust its banking app for the AR, NatWest has optimised the user experience for eye tracking in Apple’s VisionOS and improved security measures.

Customers can access the digital assistant Cora+, based on generative AI, for an intuitive, conversational banking experience. They can also visualise their financial world on a large virtual canvas, leveraging NatWest’s core features such as viewing credit scores, managing spending and exploring insights. To navigate within the app features, users interact with them by looking at icons, tapping their fingers to select one, flicking their wrist to scroll, or using a virtual keyboard or dictation to type.

“We are very pleased to now offer our excellent Retail banking app through an immersive new experience. It will be interesting to take learnings, understand how customers use the app in this new technology to deal with their finances and understand how we can create bespoke propositions to serve them even better. It’s just one insight into how the future of banking could look in the future – watch this space.”

Wendy Redshaw, Chief Digital Information Officer at NatWest Group

As an early adopter of Apple’s new device, NatWest will use the opportunity to gather insights into how spatial computing could allow customers to visualise their finances more immersively and innovate its own banking experience in accordance with the technology of the future.

The tech giant’s product has now launched in the UK, where NatWest’s mobile banking app recently hit 10 million users. Vision Pro has been on the market since February 2024. It first launched in the United States to further expand to some Asian markets like China, Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore, and then to the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, and France.

With a robust pre-ordering process, Apple reportedly sold 200,000 Vision Pros during its first 10 days on the market. The tech giant expects to sell between 400,000 and 450,000 Vision Pro units in total this year.