Mark Zuckerberg changed our world with social media. Last week he launched something that could change it with eyewear.
For about a decade, Meta has been working on an audacious project: AR glasses stylish enough to pass as regular eyewear, and yet so powerful that they could one day replace the smartphone.
At last week’s Meta developer conference, the company showed off Orion: an AR glasses prototype that comes closer to this vision than any other device in its category.
Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO, declared that they are “the most advanced glasses in the world.”
Meta has spent tens of billions of dollars on its AR hardware plans, and the company is not alone in its pursuit of wearable computing.
Google, Apple, Samsung, and others all are working on AR glasses. Snapchat maker Snap unveiled its latest version of its AR Spectacles glasses at an event last week.
Snap’s Spectacles, and Meta’s Orion glasses, do offer a fascinating look at the future of personal computing – a future that now appears just years away.
However, they also show why it’s been so challenging for tech companies to make AR glasses, and why none of the big companies are ready to turn their prototypes into mass-market products just yet.
Meta’s Orion glasses do look more or less like a regular pair of glasses, albeit somewhat oversize, with thick rims and temples.
Those who wear them report they see holograms overlaid over a view of their real world. These include a number of different apps, including Instagram, Facebook Messenger for chats and video calls, a web browser, videos, a retro space shooter, and a 3D game of Pong that one can play against another person wearing the same set of glasses.
Meta’s Orion glasses use eye tracking to help users navigate through menus, and come with a futuristic wrist-worn controller that looks a bit like a fitness tracker. The wristband measures electrical currents to identify nerve signals travelling to and from the brain, which makes it possible to track subtle finger movements that can then be used to navigate through Orion’s on-screen menus.
Meta also integrated hand tracking into the glasses, added an outward-facing camera to let AI recognise real-world objects, silicon carbide lenses for optimised optics, as well as custom-designed chips to minimise power consumption and achieve up to three hours of battery life.
Integrating all of that advanced technology also comes with a significant downside. At this point, Orion would be much too expensive, and too hard to manufacture, to achieve mass-market scale. The company only produced a small number of Orion glasses that will primarily be given out to company executives and employees.
Snap isn’t quite ready to sell its AR glasses to the public either yet; Spectacles are even bulkier than Meta’s Orion glasses, and their internal battery lasts just 45 minutes per charge. Spectacles do have brighter and sharper AR overlays than Meta’s Orion glasses, but their small field-of-view significantly reduces the sense of immersion.
Meta, meanwhile, has plans to sell the next version of Orion to consumers. The company is already trialling a higher-resolution version of the glasses, and also plans to make the glasses, which currently weigh about 100 grams, lighter and less bulky. But the biggest goal is a more affordable price.
All of this is getting us closer to the future of eyewear; however, we are not there yet.
Wesley Diphoko is a technology analyst. He has been operating at the intersection of technology and media as the Editor-In-Chief of FastCompany (SA) magazine. You can follow him on X via: @WesleyDiphoko
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