Advances in 3D hardware and software have led to increasingly cheaper and simple-to-use immersive virtual reality systems that can provide real-time interactive 3D data representation. The immersive analytics field is developing as the newest avatar of 3D visual analyt- ics, which may relaunch the long enduring 2D vs 3D visualization debate. However, the terms of the debate have changed: leveraging 3D human perception within virtual environments is now easier, and the immersive quality of today’s rendering is sufficient enough for researchers to concentrate on testing and designing immersive data representation and interaction rather than on technological problems. In this position paper we propose a short historical perspective on the use of immersive technologies for visual analytics and on the 2D vs 3D debate. We stress out five principles that we think should be followed to explore the HMD-based visual analytics design space, before introducing ongoing work within the IDEA project.