The Ray-Ban Meta connected glasses will take a new major step in their evolution, while Apple is still working on a successor to the Vision Pro. Meta plans to integrate a screen into its smart glasses from 2025, an advance which could transform these connected glasses into real augmented reality glasses, approaching the functions of the Meta Quest.
A screen to enrich the user experience
According to the Financial Times, Meta plans to equip its connected Ray-Bans with a small internal screen from the second half of 2025. This new version, still developed in partnership with the Franco-Italian company EssilorLuxottica, would retain a price around 300 dollars. The screen would primarily be used to display notifications and responses from Meta’s virtual assistant, providing an alternative to the audio playback currently offered.
The current Ray-Ban Meta, launched in October 2023, is already enjoying great success. Equipped with discreet speakers, cameras and microphones, they allow you to listen to music, take photos and interact with the AI assistant. Francesco Milleri, CEO of EssilorLuxottica, says this latest generation has sold better in a few months than the previous ones in two years.
The race for AR glasses is accelerating
This development is part of a broader strategy from Meta, which recently unveiled its Orion AR glasses prototype. Although not expected to be commercially available for several years, these more sophisticated glasses use innovative silicon carbide lens technology to project 3D content into the real-world environment.
Apple is not left behind in this technological race. While the Vision Pro was released in early 2024 and had mixed success, the Cupertino company is also reportedly working on its own AR glasses, considered the future successor to the iPhone. Google is also in the race and a few days ago announced Android XR, its OS dedicated to virtual and augmented reality interfaces. Some observers believe that smart glasses could actually become our main computing devices in the years to come, replacing the smartphone.
Andrew Bosworth, technical director of Meta, declared that 2025 would be “the most important year in the history of Reality Labs”, the division responsible for the development of the company’s VR glasses and headsets. Despite significant losses ($13 billion over the first three quarters of 2024), Meta continues to invest massively in this sector, convinced that the future of personal computing will involve mixed reality and artificial intelligence.
