Insurance claims for VR headsets around accidental home damages saw a huge increase last year.

According to insurer Aviva, home insurance claims involving VR headsets rose by almost a third (31%) and have seen an overall increase of 68% over the last five years.

The average value of a VR-related claim sits at about £650, Aviva said, with TVs found to be the most damaged item in people’s homes.

Reasons for VR-related home claims include a controller being thrown into a TV, a child smashing a designer figurine off of a mantle-piece and customers toppling over and falling head-first into home items.

So far this year, Aviva has already received a handful of claims after reports of people falling into or hitting TV screens.

The firm said that it expects further incidents to occur in the near future as VR headsets proved a popular Christmas gift, and generally become increasingly popular.

Commenting on the research, Kelly Whittington, UK property claims director for Aviva, said: “As new games and gadgets become popular, we often see this playing through in the claims made by our customers.

“In the past we’ve seen similar trends involving consoles with handsets, fitness games and even the likes of rogue fidget spinners!

“These devices can be a great source of fun, but we’d encourage people to be mindful of their surroundings and take a look at their home insurance to make sure it suits their needs.”

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VR gaming is proving to be a popular new pastime for millions of people, especially since Facebook-owned Oculus released its affordable Oculus Quest 2 headset.

Currently, VR tech is also being utilised in a variety of different areas, including the education sector as an innovative teaching material, and even fooling cows increase milk yields.

A project born out of a Strathclyde Uni and NMIS partnership is looking to reduce rehabilitation time for patients with stroke, dystonia, and sports injuries by up to 30% using a VR gaming platform.

The two-year PRIME-VR2 project, launched in 2021, will create a ‘digital environment’ using VR within rehabilitation programmes.

VR technology will also sit side-by-side with technology such as artificial intelligence and augmented reality as part of the development of the metaverse—a virtual space where users can interact with each other using these technologies.

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