Background
CUPRA, the performance brand of Spanish carmaker SEAT S.A., has built a mixed reality application for standalone headsets that lets prospective buyers see and customise its cars at full size before a physical example reaches the showroom floor. The brand frames the programme as an extension of its marketing strategy rather than a technology trial, and has pushed it out across its dealer network and into a series of brand events.
Inside the CUPRA Garages
The brand has deployed over 400 headsets at CUPRA Garages worldwide. Visitors get a life-size, three-dimensional view of the electric CUPRA Tavascan and the CUPRA Terramar, and can change body colour and wheels, open a door and sit inside the car while still seeing the showroom around them. A UK retailer offering the experience describes customers walking the perimeter of the vehicle, using their hands to open doors and the boot, pressing buttons, and sitting in a positioned chair to reach the centre console and infotainment screen. A virtual reality padel game sits alongside the configurator, tying the experience to a sport the brand sponsors.
Taking the experience onto aircraft
The same application was adapted for a four-month pilot in the Business Class cabin of selected Lufthansa Allegris flights from Munich to New York, Cape Town and India, which concluded in February 2025. Passengers were handed headsets and could configure the Tavascan and explore its interior and exterior from their seat. Beyond the configurator, the in-flight build carried a virtual reality tour of the streets of Barcelona and a virtual CUPRA Garage, plus a virtual version of the brand's Design Obsession catwalk presented through avatar fashion models. CUPRA says it is the first automotive brand to offer an experience of this kind in the air.
The wider Lufthansa in-flight headset programme, run with the headset vendor, reached close to 4,000 travellers and took the 2025 APEX Award for Best Inflight Entertainment.
Technology
- Standalone mixed reality headsets, one per customer, running a purpose-built native application
- Real-time 3D vehicle models rendered on-device, so the experience works without a network connection — a requirement for use at 10,000 feet
- Hand tracking for opening doors and pressing controls, with the passthrough view keeping the physical surroundings visible
- Application development by Berlin-based agency MSM.digital
Beyond the dealership
CUPRA has run the same interactive virtual experiences at Primavera Sound, the IAA in Munich, the Sitges Film Festival, Formula E in Berlin and events at CASA SEAT. During a Configuration Day at the Terramar racetrack, the full FC Barcelona first-team squad configured cars and tried the mixed reality experience alongside product experts.
