Meta's new $1,000+ smart glasses: screen, apps, notifications, gesture wristband

Meta is slated to become the first company to release smart glasses that feature a screen for displaying apps and photos. The new pair of smart glasses could be released as early as the end of this year.

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According to unnamed sources familiar with the project who spoke to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Meta is working on a pair of premium smart glasses that will be priced at more than $1,000, with the price hovering somewhere around the $1,300 and $1,400 mark.

These smart glasses are gearing up to be industry first as Meta plans on implementing a screen for displaying photos and apps, which is unsurprisingly the main component driving up the total cost of the glasses. According to Gurman, the price hike versus the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses ($299) can be attributed to the monocular panel (screen) located within the right lens's lower-right quadrant.

Due to the position of the screen, users will only be able to see apps/photos in their right eye, and the information will be at its clearest when the user is looking downward. The report also states Meta is already working on a second generation of the smart glasses, which has been codenamed Hypernova 2, and the biggest difference between Gen 1 and Gen 2 is the inclusion of a binocular display system, which adds displays to both eyes. The second iteration of the smart glasses is currently planned for 2027.

Features:

• Home screen features apps in a horizontal fashion similar to an app dock on an Apple device
• Dedicated apps for viewing photos, and notifications from other apps such as Messenger, WhatsApp, Maps
• Video and photo capturing capabilities with built-in microphone for phone calls and music playback
• Uses a highly customized version of Android
• Touch controls on the side of the glasses frame
• In-built camera to rival iPhone 13 from 2021
• Plans for a gesture wristband for interacting with the glasses through wrist rotations, pinching, finger-to-thumb taps