Meta Platforms unveiled a new line of smart glasses at its Connect 2025 event on Wednesday, with the most significant launch being the Meta Ray-Ban Display, the company's first consumer-ready smart glasses featuring a built-in display in the right lens.
The event featured multiple failed live demonstrations of the glasses' capabilities, including a cooking tutorial and a video call, which CEO Mark Zuckerberg attributed to Wi-Fi issues.
Zuckerberg acknowledged the failures, stating, "I don’t know what happened," and later remarked on the irony of years of development being thwarted by the event's Wi-Fi, saying, "you spend years making technology and then the Wi-Fi at the day kind of catches you." Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth humorously noted that his team would now have to debug the issue, emphasizing the pressure of the September 30 release date.
Despite the technical hiccups, the keynote highlighted the glasses' features, such as a high-resolution display, 3K video, double the battery life, and integration with a Neural Band wristband for gesture control.
This launch marks a pivotal step in Meta's strategy to integrate artificial intelligence into everyday wearables, positioning the glasses as a vehicle for "superintelligence." The event also introduced the Oakley Meta Vanguard, a sports-focused model for athletes, and a second-generation update to the standard Ray-Ban Meta glasses with improved battery life and video quality.
The Meta Ray-Ban Display, priced at $799, features a small display in the right lens capable of showing text messages, video calls, turn-by-turn navigation, and visual results from AI queries. It will be available for purchase starting September 30, 2025, at select brick-and-mortar retailers in the US, including Best Buy, LensCrafters, Sunglass Hut, and Ray-Ban Stores.
The glasses are sold with a companion Meta Neural Band wristband, which uses electromyography (EMG) to detect hand gestures for control, such as pinching to select, swiping to navigate, and twisting to adjust volume. The wristband offers up to 18 hours of battery life and has an IPX7 water rating.
The display has a 20-degree field of view and a resolution of 600 x 600 pixels, with brightness ranging from 30 to 5,000 nits, though visibility can be challenging in direct sunlight. The external camera is a 12-megapixel sensor, recording 1080p video for up to six hours per charge, with an external case providing an additional 30 hours of battery life.
The launch of the display glasses is a key part of Meta's effort to build its own consumer electronics ecosystem, competing with companies like Apple and Google. The company has invested billions in hardware and recently made a $3.5 billion investment in EssilorLuxottica, its partner for the Ray-Ban brand.
The Oakley Meta Vanguard is a wraparound design aimed at runners, cyclists, and other athletes, priced at $499. It features a centered camera, louder speakers with deeper bass, and new video shooting modes like 60-frames-per-second video, slow-motion, and time-lapse capture.
The glasses offer improved water resistance and integrate with fitness platforms such as Garmin and Strava to deliver real-time training stats and post-workout summaries. They will be available starting October 21, 2025, in several countries including the US, Canada, UK, and parts of Europe and Asia.
A second-generation version of the standard Ray-Ban Meta glasses was also announced, featuring almost twice the battery life of the previous model and improved video recording capabilities, now supporting 3K video. The starting price for this updated model is $379, up from $299.
The Meta Connect 2025 conference, held at Meta's headquarters in Menlo Park, California, was a major event focused on the company's AI and wearable technology advancements The new glasses are part of Meta's strategy to move AI from a reactive tool to a constantly running service that assists users throughout the day.
