Rec Room

recroom.com

HQ: Seattle, Washington, United States

500

Media & Entertainment

Company research

Public company, workplace, funding, and market signals

Updated Aug 16, 2026

Overview

Rec Room Inc. was a Seattle-based social gaming and user-generated-content platform founded in 2016 as Against Gravity. Its cross-platform virtual world let people socialize, play millions of player-created experiences, and create and monetize games, rooms, avatars, and virtual goods. Rec Room announced that its platform would shut down on June 1, 2026, citing the inability to reach sustainable profitability.

Primary product

Rec Room, a free cross-platform social gaming and UGC creation platform available on VR headsets, PC, mobile devices, and consoles.

Founded

2016

Headquarters

300 Elliott Ave W, Suite 450, Seattle, Washington 98119, United States

Team size

70-80 employees in the latest available company-profile estimate; the company had just over 100 employees after its August 2025 layoffs and subsequently announced a June 2026 shutdown.

Work style

Flexible

Industry

Software Development

Sub-industry

Social gaming, virtual reality, user-generated content, and creator platforms

Offices

Seattle, Washington, United States

Business model

Freemium consumer gaming

In-app purchases of virtual currency

Subscription

Two-sided creator marketplace

User-generated-content revenue sharing

Funding

Stage

Late-stage private company; last reported round was Series F in 2021

Total raised

$294M

Latest round

Series F (some databases refer to this as Series E) · Dec 2021

Latest amount

$145M

Series F / Series E in some databases

Dec 2021 · Coatue Management

$145M

Series D

Mar 2021 · Sequoia Capital

$100M

Series C

Dec 2020 · Madrona Venture Group

$20M

Series B

Jun 2019 · Sequoia Capital

$15M

Series A

May 2017 · Sequoia Capital

$9M

Seed

Sep 2016 · Sequoia Capital

$5M

People & investors

Leadership

Nick Fajt

Co-founder and CEO

Cameron Brown

Co-founder and Chief Creative Officer

Oscar Mraz

CFO

David Haley

VP of Engineering

Founders

Bilal Orhan

Co-founder

Dan Kroymann

Co-founder

John Bevis

Co-founder

Josh Wehrly

Co-founder

Investors

Madrona Venture Group

Maveron

Pantera Capital

Sequoia Capital

The Venture Reality Fund

Vulcan Capital

Work & culture

The company described its culture as fun, supportive, high-trust, inclusive, and welcoming. Its careers materials emphasized autonomy, mentorship, cross-functional engineering teams, and building a social product used by a global community. Later company communications acknowledged organizational complexity, high spending, and the need for a flatter, more startup-like structure.

Work style

Flexible

Compensation

Public company-profile data surfaced estimated salary signals including approximately $127,746 annually for a senior engineer, $89,002 for a concept artist, and $87,869 for a lead game designer. These are third-party estimates rather than confirmed company salary bands. The company also offered stock options.

Benefits

100% remote or hybrid work from the Seattle office

Medical insurance

Dental and orthodontic insurance

Vision insurance

Paid parental leave

Life insurance

Short-term and long-term disability coverage

Flexible spending account

Fertility and hormone-affirming care

Employee assistance program

Unlimited paid time off

Career development and mentorship

401(k) with 100% employer matching up to 6%

Competitive stock options

Product & market

Pricing

Free-to-play with optional Rec Room Plus subscription, token-based in-app purchases, and creator-marketplace transactions. Rec Room Plus was publicly reported at approximately $7.99 per month; token packages included approximately 2,500 tokens for $4.99 through 35,000 tokens for $49.99. Pricing and availability changed during the shutdown process.

Differentiators

—VR-first product heritage combined with support for PC, mobile, and consoles
—In-world creation tools that let users build while socializing, without requiring a traditional game engine for basic creation
—Large library of player-created rooms and experiences
—Integrated social graph, voice chat, avatars, and multiplayer gameplay
—Rec Room Studio integration with Unity for more advanced creators
—Creator monetization and avatar-item marketplace
—Cross-platform play across a broad range of devices

Technology

Unity

C++

Unreal Engine

Python

JavaScript

Java

Kubernetes

Terraform

Jenkins

Databricks

Elasticsearch

SQL

Amplitude

Braze

Prefect

Figma

Blender

Android Studio

Git

Customers

Consumers and gamers

VR users

PC and console players

Mobile players

User-generated-content creators

Families and social communities

Brands and IP partners, including Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Mattel, Barbie, Walmart, Gucci, and Coca-Cola

Competitors

Roblox

VRChat

Fortnite Creative / Unreal Editor for Fortnite

Meta Horizon Worlds

Core by Manticore Games

Minecraft

Scale & contact

Estimated revenue

$10M-$20M annually; one third-party company profile estimated approximately $15.2M. Other analyses produced substantially higher estimates for earlier years, so this figure should be treated as indicative rather than audited.

Estimated monthly visits

377.1K

Traffic estimate as of Jun 2026

Signals & risks

Layoff

Mar 2025

Rec Room announced a 16% workforce reduction, citing slower gaming-market growth, higher interest rates, a more difficult fundraising environment, and the need to become self-sustaining without relying on another fundraise.

Source

Layoff

Aug 2025

The company announced layoffs affecting roughly half of its team. A Washington WARN filing identified 141 affected employees; the company was reported to have just over 100 employees after the cuts.

Source

Other

Aug 2025

Rec Room disclosed that user-generated-content revenue was growing but had materially thinner economics than first-party content: after platform fees and creator payouts, the company retained about 30 cents per dollar of UGC revenue versus about 70 cents on first-party revenue.

Source

Shutdown

Mar 2026

Rec Room announced that its platform would shut down at noon Pacific on June 1, 2026, stating that it had not found a sustainable path to profitability and that costs consistently exceeded revenue.

Source

Acquisition

Mar 2026

Snap acquired selected Rec Room assets, with some employees moving to Specs Inc., Snap's augmented-reality hardware subsidiary. Deal terms and the number of transferring employees were not disclosed.

Source

Latest news

Rec Room announces platform shutdown after failing to reach sustainable profitability

Rec Room official blog · Mar 2026

Rec Room announced that its game, rec.net website, and Rec Room Studio online services would shut down on June 1, 2026. The company cited unfavorable VR and gaming-market conditions and costs that exceeded revenue.

Snap acquires assets from Rec Room as social gaming platform announces shutdown

GeekWire · Mar 2026

Snap confirmed the acquisition of selected Rec Room assets, with some Rec Room employees joining Specs Inc. to work on augmented-reality eyewear.

Rec Room finances and UGC revenue

Rec Room official blog · Aug 2025

CEO Nick Fajt explained the company's financial pressures, the growth of UGC revenue, creator payouts, and the significantly lower margin Rec Room retained on creator-made content.

Rec Room lays off half its staff in major shakeup at Seattle startup

GeekWire · Aug 2025

Rec Room laid off roughly half its workforce after determining that its cost structure and broad UGC expansion strategy were unsustainable.

Rec Room raises $145M at a $3.5B valuation for its user-generated immersive gaming platform

TechCrunch · Dec 2021

Coatue led Rec Room's $145M late-stage financing, with participation from Sequoia Capital, Index Ventures, and Madrona Venture Group. The round valued the company at $3.5B.

Jobs and careers at Rec Room

9 jobs at Rec Room

Staff Product Designer

Remote

Product

San Francisco, CA; San Francisco, CA, United States

2w ago

Remote

Full-time