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The hype continues to build around the arrival of Meta's futuristic Hypernova (a.k.a. Celeste) smart glasses, which will reportedly add a small heads-up display in one eye and a neural wristband (Ceres) to control the interface. These will reportedly cost around $800 and will be announced at Meta Connect on September 17. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has stated that Meta is preparing to sell 150,00-200,000 units of its Hypernova glasses over the next two years.
Some have even started calling these the next version of the current Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses. However, both Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and CTO Andrew Bosworth have been teasing that Meta will release multiple products in the smart glasses space this fall.
And the CEO of EssilorLuxotica (maker of Ray-Bans), Francesco Milleri, said in early 2025 that over 2 million units of Meta Ray-Bans had already been sold and that the company was preparing to scale up to sell 10 million units annually by the end of 2026.
Also: Samsung 'Galaxy Glasses' powered by Android XR are reportedly on track to be unveiled this month
All of that points to an upgraded version of the $300 audio-only Meta Ray-Bans coming this fall -- and being announced alongside the future-oriented Hypernova glasses at Meta Connect.
For the past two years, I've used the Meta Ray-Bans daily for audio calls, listening to podcasts and music, and taking photos. I'll be at Meta Connect in person on September 17 to see and demo everything Meta unveils. Here is the list of practical upgrades that would make Meta's AI glasses even more useful and usable.
1. Double the battery life
The Meta Ray-Bans are officially rated for four hours of battery life. However, if you turn off the always-on listening for the "Hey Meta" prompt (and long-press the right stem to activate it instead), you can increase that pretty significantly. That's true if you're using the smart glasses mostly for phone calls, listening to audio, and perhaps a few AI prompts.
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