Meta Platform Inc. is available with amazing smart glasses, along with Oakley, launching new models targeting athletes and including improved video recording.
The company launched a new model Friday based on Oakley’s HSTN design, marking the company’s first expansion from Ray-Ban as it has no display glasses. Like the original model, the Oakley version can make calls, play music, take photos and videos, and use Meta’s artificial intelligence to answer questions about its surroundings.
The new version starts at $399, and the limited edition model with gold trim costs $499, including video recordings at about twice the battery life, with 3K resolution and waterproofness.
“We are increasingly seeing performance use cases for ray boxes, such as people riding on rollers and riding them on water, so we’re trying to rely on that,” Alex Himmel, the company’s vice president of wearables, said in an interview.
Arriving at the second glasses brand is far from certain. Meta’s first glasses, the story of Ray-Ban, failed in 2021. But it has been a huge success in its follow-up release in 2023, giving the social networking giant a real potential hardware base in the AI competition.
“It’s crazy. We’re surprised by the popularity,” Himmer said. The Ray Basket “will be the last pair of glasses without examples. We said we’re going to swing it twice and if it doesn’t work, we’re going to go all out.”
Instead, in addition to the latest Oakley model, the company has a multi-year roadmap with no display category and is planning a follow-up oakley glasses based on Sphera Design to facilitate the matter for this later this year. That pair will target cyclists and have a central camera. The cameras for Friday’s models are located in the upper corner, such as the ray version.
Displayless glasses are part of the overall META AI hardware strategy. The company plans to go to later this year Report. In 2027 Aim to launch Its first true augmented reality glasses will blend digital applications with the real world.
Meta’s Form-Factor is in trouble, with several other technology companies working on competitors. apple Inc. plans to introduce its first batch of glasses products by the end of 2026, Bloomberg News has Report. The device operates similarly to a Meta product, but can be better synced with the Apple ecosystem. Amazon.com Inc. also sells glasses, but their current models lack cameras.
Meta sells millions of glasses every week and has a weekly purchase of “nice, increased times”, thanks to the growing number of Thunderdogs, which improves the ray style among many “little stuff.” He said audio quality and microphones are beginning to surpass independent earbuds, while camera and AI quality have also been improved.
Still, Himmel said battery life is still the “first complaint” about the Thunderbolt version. The new Oakley model can run for 8 hours at a time, and the charging box holds 48 hours of juice. “You should expect 40% bumps” he said, attributeing the improvements to new battery chemistry and software optimizations rather than larger battery packs.
Like Ray Bon, Oakley owns Essilorluxottica SA, calling Oakley the second most popular brand after Ray-Ban. Meta will launch a new brand “as fast as possible” under the Essilorluxottica portfolio, Himmel said. “We’re going to have to move quickly because in the fashion world things move very quickly. Now, what’s hit now may not be a year from now on. We need to hit every brand we want quickly.”
The first Oakley model will be pre-ordered on July 11 and will be a limited edition pair of $499. The $399 version will be released in gray, black, brown and transparent colors in the coming months. There will be a version of clear, transitional and polarized lenses. Like ray seeding, users can swap lenses into prescription optics.
