While it's no Oculus Rift headset, Google's Cardboard initiative has a huge role to play in VR by putting it in the hands of anyone with $25 and a smartphone.

According to Game Rant 's latest report, the Google VR Cardboard headset only costs around $20. The company decided to do this so that a wider audience can access its virtual reality technology.

The apparent name of the Google Cardboard competitor is the "Microsoft VR kit." There's no word about whether the Microsoft VR kit will be on sale for the general public.

The company has designed its cardboard packaging in such a manner that you can easily turn it into a VR headset that can fit your smartphone, including the iPhone 6s, as you can see in the video ...

The outcome was Cardboard, which Google describes as "a no-frills enclosure that transforms a phone into a basic VR headset, and the accompanying open software toolkit that makes writing VR ...

Business Technology Virtual reality for cheapskates, no headsets required Originally published March 18, 2016 at 12:00 pm Updated March 18, 2016 at 7:07 pm ...

Matt Weinberger When you're wearing Google Cardboard, it's a full-fledged, head-sensing VR experiment that I didn't need to strap on a heavy headset to get. No, it's not quite as high-resolution ...

The PlayStation VR 2 rig is another great option for the full virtual reality experience and while it's a bit more expensive, it's still not in the top-tier of headsets that can be $1,000 or more.