Believe if you worked at Meta when the glasses just came out there was also a limited fully transparent frame as well.
I’ve tried the glasses myself, and I’m convinced that wearable eyewear like this will eventually replace the mobile phone. With ongoing advances in miniaturization, it’s only a matter of time before AR and AV are fully integrated into everyday wearables.
Once there is an actual usable in-glasses screen, I will agree.
A few years ago I tried someone's smartglasses with a screen. It basically had similar functionality to my first Fitbit: it would show texts, notifications, caller ID.
I really want one of those and went looking, but couldn't find it.
Meta, Microsoft, Apple, etc. are far more likely to snitch on you to the government you actually live under.
With that said, I don’t think these can replace phones until they’re quite a lot smaller and lighter. And to make it worse, you’d need at least two pairs - regular and sun. Possibly three if you’re someone who regularly uses safety glasses.
That said, I'm not sure I'd want smart glasses. Being stuck on a computer for work, I try to take some time every day to be completely free of digital things. It's hard enough to do that with a smart phone in my pocket vying for my attention. I imagine it would be only harder with smart glasses over my eyeballs.
Those things on glasses and I ditch my phone immediately.
Meta says they will open it up though.
I see this world all the time at the beach; lots of people wear sunglasses there.
Ray Ban does it for their Meta glasses, but Lensology can handle stronger prescription lenses.
The frame will probably change slightly over time to make them incompatible.
I just sent an old pair of glasses to eyeglasses.com for new lenses. I never considered this to be a big deal.
This is probably true.
The rest of your comment is probably not true for most people.
It just depends on how strong your prescription is and how willing the shop/website is to do special orders.
If you are almost blind, then your choice of lenses/frames will be much lower than if you are only slightly blind(most people). Any reputable eyeglass/optician shop should be able to make custom lenses for pretty much any frame. They can't always do the super sleek shades that some people like to wear.
We'll need to overhaul the concept of limited liability before we do that though, the thought of someone being left without their eyes because a company goes bankrupt and no-one is at fault is pretty horrifying.
I think that they've done it, this is Meta's iPod
I would love to try these types of devices but there is no way I'd ever give money to Meta or put my personal information into their systems or encourage my friends and family to do so either.
Hopefully Meta puts in a bunch of R&D to see what works in this space and then someone else (Apple?) just copies it.
BTW, I have to consciously turn off my cybersecurity mindset when thinking about smart glasses. It's hard not to see all the new attack vectors they introduce.
I wear my Ray Ban Metas a lot (bought in 2023) and love them but i can't take selfies with them. I have to pull out my phone. They are complimentary to phone tho i do enjoy not having my phone on me to take pics, vids and ask it for the time now (add 5G to it and it will do more like stream music).
Whatever Open AI is working on to replace the iPhone it will need to be able take selfies! I'm betting it's just an AI Phone with the experience of the movie H.E.R. where almost everything is done from the lock screen and it takes the best selfies of you (gets you to the best lighting) and everything under the sun.
Laptops, of course, have the much bigger screen and keyboard, not really replicated by smartphones. They have use-cases that smartphone can’t cover well for hardware reasons. So they’ve stuck around (in a notably diminished form).
If good AR glasses become a thing… I dunno, they could easily replace monitors generally, right? Then a laptop just becomes a keyboard. That’s a hardware function that seems necessary.
What niche is left for the smartphone?
I believe that was the entire point of the comparison. Smartphones replaces SOME use cases of laptops in the same way ubiquitous smart glasses could replaces SOME use cases of smartphones.
Laptops and tablets replaced desktops. Nobody sits down in an office and does work on a smartphone.
Smartphones replaced phones, pagers, music players and cameras.
I also don't understand how they're used to locate items around the house. Is there some sort of GPS? Or do you mean it helps by virtue of seeing (e.g. prescription)?
AR glasses will be a hit, no doubt, but I don't see what's so special about glasses with a mic, camera and speaker on them. Seems especially for an older person that it would be more useful getting a phone with a screen and pointing at things and seeing it on a display.
Hey Meta, read the text on this label and tell me what it says.
Hey Meta, do you see the keys on the counter?
Hey Meta, can you tell me what is in front of me?
It projects the sound into your ear.
The glasses have a camera, and small speakers near your ears. They also have a microphone, so you can give them voice commands. Like Amazon Alexa, but in the glasses.
A phone you have to hold in your hand whereas glasses you don't. Therefore glasses are superior for these use cases.
You really need young people to carry tech like this, and needing them to wear millennial fashion from 10 years ago so camera and compute fit will just make it that much harder.
Always-on microphone and camera sold by one of the world's sketchiest privacy invaders? Check.
Display that actually takes advantage of the glasses form factor? Nope. Sounds like this could just as easily be the Humane pin.
The camera may or may not be always on, but it can be turned on by software activated by the always-on mic (again, demonstrated by the promo video), so it would be best to treat it as though it is.
[0] https://about.fb.com/news/2025/06/introducing-oakley-meta-gl...
I agree that the primary issue is that it's a software-controlled microphone with no off switch controlled by software written by Meta. I only emphasized the wake word listening in response to OP's claim that it's not always on when it must be.
> 15. "Loaded firearm" means any firearm loaded with ammunition or any firearm which is possessed by one who, at the same time, possesses a quantity of ammunition which may be used to discharge such firearm.
So I guess I'm using the New York definition of an always-on camera.
they have proven over and over and over and over again they are absolutely not trustworthy.
at some point we have to come to grips with the fact that people like zuck, elon, andreeson, and other tech monarchs are openly hostile and despise us when we ask for anything remotely resembling transparency for their companies but repeatedly abuse us and openly scoff at our privacy.
the fact that we collectively don’t understand the repercussions of this really is a bad sign.
i very well may have misunderstood your meaning, tho. i hope so.
People were so angry in 2013.
I don't know about everyone, but I found it pretty hard to use. Caveat, I didn't get them fit to me, I was supervising an intern working on a speculative Glass project, and they were fit to him.
AR would be neat, but voice interfaces are acheivable at an approachable cost. I'm not one to talk to a computer, and I wear prescription lenses, so these glasses don't appeal to me, but I can see there's a market there, not sure how big or if Meta can capture it.
Mic and speakers, too.
Glass attempted a display, but IMHO, it was unusable, so I understand why you would try the same thing with no display. Or the same thing, but mounted on your wrist (Google Wear).
Not sure why theverge gets linked so much here.
But at least the last paragraph seems to be adding something, although the rest of the article is indeed just a re-hash of the press-release.
> Meta recently signed a multi-year deal with EssilorLuxottica, the parent company behind Ray-Ban, Oakley, and other eyewear brands. The Meta Ray-Bans have sold over two million pairs to date, and EssilorLuxottica recently disclosed that it plans to sell 10 million smart glasses with Meta annually by 2026. “This is our first step into the performance category,” Alex Himel, Meta’s head of wearables, tells me. “There’s more to come.”
Heavy frames and large lenses tend to compensate for larger noses, and other facial issues (although they won't come out and say that). Clear glasses can really focus on the eyes.
I know a couple of women that have made large, heavy-rimmed glasses into a real fashion statement.
Unfortunate.
I was visiting a museum yesterday and someone was using these to livestream/record their own (bad) tour. Security stopped someone doing this with their phone earlier, but had no idea what this guy was doing.
There's camera's everywhere at this point: every doorbell/garage, every store, every light on the street, even my friend's pet/baby monitors when I visit. I hate it.
How are these "smart glasses" legal in places like Germany where you (supposedly) can't even have a dashcam?
I'm yet to be convinced these are useful and not just another way to inject ads directly into eyeballs.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GI_glasses
[2] - https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=glassholes
I’m personally more excited about the Mentra Live glasses, which are fully programmable with AugmentOS.
i would argue, though, that having integrated access to AI that can react to what the user is seeing is a form of digitally augmented reality.
I discovered goodr recently and they are great. 25$ high quality sunglasses that I can actually trust have real UV ratings. Seeing people wear ray bans or oakleys is really funny
garbawarb•4h ago
kube-system•3h ago
syntaxing•3h ago
woleium•3h ago
kube-system•3h ago
Titanium glasses are lightweight because a very minimal amount of material is used. This is possible for regular glasses because you can make them with a ~1mm cross-section. When you want to put electronics inside of them, you need much more material.
diggan•3h ago
saltcured•1h ago
I assume the poster above imagined the something inside could just be voids, like a tiny aircraft. But yes, some kind of low density filler could also add some stability in areas you don't want mass metal but also don't have electronics or battery "cargo".
isatty•2h ago
kube-system•2h ago
LtdJorge•2h ago
Edit: Just checked, it does exist.
kube-system•1h ago
Between the weight of material and the electronics, I don't really see anything approaching the feel that someone that discerning would want.
saltcured•1h ago
I guess the problem is can you extrude and form something so small with the precision and metallurgical properties you want to maintain. You probably don't want to just cast it in the final shape, right?
LtdJorge•2h ago