Are you experiencing a problem where your Oculus Quest 2 keeps on losing its hand tracking functionality? Does the issue occur when you use the headset and look in one direction or move around the room? Before replacing your Quest 2 hardware, refer to the troubleshooting steps in this guide that might have a fix for you.
Oculus Quest 2 is an all-in-one wireless standalone virtual reality headset. It is an excellent piece of hardware to share digital spaces over the internet and to experience virtual environments. Furthermore, Quest 2 lets you interact with objects and people from anywhere in the world inside of these VRs.
Oculus Quest 2 hand tracking brings next-level immersion to support VR experiences. However, quite a few users report frequent malfunctions of the headset’s hand tracking function. Let’s find out why your Oculus Quest 2 is behaving that way and how you can eliminate the causes of the tracking issue.
What kind of tracking does the Oculus Quest 2 have?
Oculus Quest 2 offers 6 degrees of freedom (6DoF) hand tracking feature. When you switch off the tracking mode from your VR headset Settings menu, you still utilize the hand tracking feature in the default 3DoF mode. Let us explain this a bit.
Why does my quest 2 Keep losing tracking?
If your Oculus Quest 2 headset keeps on losing the hand tracking functionality, it could be due to any one of the following reasons.
- Other LED lights in the room or ambient light are causing issues with the headset tracking mode.
- The controller batteries are low.
- Electrical devices are interfering with the headset’s ability to operate correctly.
- Oculus Quest 2 is storing fault guardian settings.
- Oculus 2 is running on outdated software.
How do you fix Oculus Quest 2 tracking issues?
Try the following troubleshooting steps to fix the Oculus Quest 2 tracking issues.
Turn tracking Off and On
Some users have reported that a simple action like turning off and on the tracking mode on the headset fixed the hand tracking issues. To do this, access the Oculus Quest 2 headset Settings. Next, go to the Device option and turn off the “Tracking” option. Now go back to the same menu and turn the option on again.
Reboot Oculus Quest 2 headset
If reactivating the tracking feature on your headset does not solve the problem, try rebooting your Oculus Quest 2. Quite often, a simple reboot can fix various tech problems. To do this, hold down the power button for more than 10 seconds until you see the Restart option. Now select the option and let the headset reboot itself.
Clean the sensors
The four sensors built into the Oculus Quest 2 headset do an incredible job of capturing your fingers as they move. However, these sensors can collect dirt, hair, or smudge and compromise the headset’s hand tracking functionality.
Therefore, it is good to clean the sensors with a mico-fiber cloth. Afterward, reboot the headset and see if this fixes your issue.
Check light conditions
Oculus Quest 2 controller comes with LEDs that the sensors track to decode your actual moves into virtual reality. However, the headset is quite sensitive to the room’s lighting condition and can affect the performance of the hand tracking feature.
It’s possible that other LEDs in your room, such as ring and web camera lights, are pointed directly to your controller LEDs and causing tracking malfunction. Therefore, look away from these lights while experiencing the virtual world.
Furthermore, if the sunlight from the windows or any bright light causes patches of light in your room, close the blinds and see if tracking is back to normal.
Change the room
If adjusting the light conditions did not fix Oculus Quest 2 hand tracking, move to another room and see if the issue persists.
Theoretically, cables, wireless devices, or power appliances could be interfering with the headset hand tracking feature. Therefore, trying the Oculus Quest 2 in another room can rule out electrical interference to be the cause of the issue.
Clear Guardian history
With Oculus Quest 2, you can create a room guardian that lets you resume playing the next time without having to recreate it. However, a few changes in your room, like new objects, can cause the headset to get confused with its hand-tracking capabilities.
To fix the issue, delete the saved guardian by going to Settings –> Guardian and clear the Guardian history. Now create a new guardian and see if tracking works fine. Also, delete saved guardians every time you change the room objects.
Update Oculus Quest 2 software
If your headset is not running on the latest software, make sure to let it update. Oculus Quest 2 can also automatically update itself when it is:
- Turned on (Including sleep mode).
- Connected to a WiFi connection and fully charged.
- Not lying on a flat surface without movement for an extended period
Furthermore, ensure that the Oculus Quest 2 sensors are not blocked; otherwise, it won’t update, and you’ll have to do it manually.
Conclusion
We hope that this guide helped you fix the “Oculus Quest 2 keeps on losing hand tracking” issue. If none of the troubleshooting steps worked, perform a factory reset of the headset. Furthermore, if you use the Oculus link and play with a 120H refresh rate, switch it to a 90Hz refresh rate and see if this improves the tracking. Good Luck!
