Snapchat may release AR glasses in mid-September
According to reports, Snap is developing a fifth iteration of its augmented reality (AR) Spectacles spectacles, which the company’s CEO, Evan Spiegel, plans to debut on September 15 at the annual Partner Summit in Los Angeles.
The brand-new Snap Spectacles are the product’s fifth iteration and the company’s second attempt at producing smart glasses with augmented reality features. It’s interesting to note that Meta is scheduled to introduce Orion, its first AR glasses, at the Connect conference at approximately the same time.
Snap will be releasing Spectacles for the first time since 2021 with this release. The first version of Spectacles was made accessible to a very small number of developers and makers and was manufactured in very small numbers. Many of these early adopters used Snapchat’s lenses with the hardware’s AR displays to build creative uses for the glasses.
The prior generation of Spectacles had a number of shortcomings in spite of its small form factor. For instance, their range of vision was quite limited, and their battery life was just 30 minutes. In addition, these glasses seemed bigger and more rounded than the original edition, which was so small and light that it looked like regular sunglasses.
Snap claims to have significantly improved the underlying technology in the most recent version. It is said that the updated Spectacles have a substantially larger field of vision and a longer battery life. Still, Snap sells them more as a developer tool than as a mainstream augmented reality offering. The cost of construction for each pair of fifth-generation Spectacles is allegedly hundreds of dollars, which will have an effect on the sale price. Additionally, Snap anticipates producing less than 10,000 pairs of smart glasses, making them an uncommon item.
Assuming the report’s accuracy, Snap plans to stay involved in the XR hardware industry, which is becoming more and more controlled by businesses like ByteDance and Meta. The $250 Pixy selfie drone was the company’s final significant hardware project, and it was cancelled four months after it was introduced in 2022. The gadget was recalled earlier this year because of a battery fire occurrence.
