At Meta Connect 2024, CEO Mark Zuckerberg showed off Meta's first public prototype for AR glasses, codenamed Orion. We had the chance to test out these AR glasses during a private demo before the event and came away genuinely shocked at how much better they are than other AR prototypes we've tested — even if they're not consumer-ready yet.
We first learned of Project Orion back in 2023, in an Information report stating Meta was having trouble getting its AR tech consumer-ready. We later spoke with a Meta engineer who promised that their first AR glasses would be as groundbreaking for AR as Oculus Rift was for VR, but we didn't know what to expect from a non-consumer prototype with behind-the-scenes baggage.
Now, Meta is sharing Orion with "select external audiences" as they "build towards our consumer AR glasses product line, which we plan to begin shipping in the near future."
My colleague Nick Sutrich, who got hands-on time with both Orion and the Meta Quest 3S the night before Meta Connect 2024, and I discussed with Nick in length his experience with the Meta AR glasses on everything from design and comfort to apps and visuals. Overall, he came away more optimistic about AR than he'd ever been before.
Meta's AR glasses are Ray-Bans fused with Quest
Picture the popular Meta Ray-Bans smart glasses, with their cameras, music streaming, and Meta AI tech. Make everything a bit thicker and heavier, and add lightweight silicon carbide lenses with uLED projectors and eye-tracking cameras to follow your gaze.
Then stick a wallet-sized computing puck in your pocket to handle the processing and battery, with the same 6DoF tracking and an operating system that will feel very familiar to Quest users — including window-pane apps with spatial anchors that float in mixed reality and stay in one place instead of being locked in front of you.
Mix all that together, and you get Meta's AR glasses!
Most current AR prototypes run a wire from your phone to your glasses, and even then, the glasses might only last an hour or two. Meta's Orion glasses use tech similar to Quest Air Link, pulling data remotely from the pocket puck, and they collectively have "all-day battery life," according to Meta. It would be a real game changer if they can pull that off in the consumer version.
The glasses themselves use "highly specialized custom silicon" that only requires "a few dozen milliwatts" of energy to run simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) tech so that the glasses don't overheat when tracking your eyes and gestures.
Like a Meta Quest 3, Meta's AR glasses use cameras for hand tracking. They also use the electromyography (EMG) neural interface wristband Zuckerberg teased earlier this year. It's much more subtle than past bulky prototypes; Nick says it looks like a normal fitness band on your wrist.
With it, Orion registers pinch gestures to select menu items, scrolling by making a fist and moving your thumb up or down, and other shortcuts. The EMG band detects tiny muscle movements in your wrist to interpret what gestures you're making, even if the AR glasses' cameras miss it. In his demo, Nick found the EMG gestures seamless.
What exactly can you do with these gestures? During Nick's demo, he was able to video call someone, scroll Instagram, and check a third messaging app simultaneously, each window splayed across his vision. He also played a game of AR pong with a Meta rep, with the software shared across both glasses.
Otherwise, it has the same tools that make Meta Ray-Bans so popular: you can snap a photo at any time, play music over the built-in speakers, or look at an object and ask Meta AI a question about it. Meta is also adding live-translation and live-video AI interpretation to Ray-Bans this year, and no doubt Meta AI will keep growing in the ensuing years before Orion becomes consumer-ready.
A step above the competition, but with problems to solve
Most current AR glasses like RayNeo Air 2S XR and Xreal Air 2 restrict their FoV to a small portion of the glasses lens, about 40–50º, and you have to be very conscious of slotting it directly in your vision to see anything. Plus, they typically plug into your smartphone or a puck with a thick cable, either draining your phone or burning through the puck in a few hours.
Meta's Orion glasses have a 70º FoV that extends from edge to edge across each lens, avoiding the sweet-spot issue. They don't need a wire, and Meta made its computing puck much more efficient.
If that sounds too good to be true, it is: There's a reason these Orion AR glasses aren't consumer-ready. However, Meta has already solved some common form factor problems, which makes us optimistic they can solve others.
First, this prototype is fairly heavy. Meta says it weighs 98g; for context, the Meta Ray-Bans weigh about 50g, and most wired AR prototypes — designed for streaming comfortably indoors — weigh in the 75g range. The Magic Leap 2, which has a comparable 70º FoV, weighs a whopping 250g, more like a headset than glasses.
Nick noted that the thick glasses temples would probably hurt his ears if he wore them for too long and that the frames themselves are thick enough that they're immediately noticeable as "tech" to onlookers — though not as goofy-looking as the new Snap Spectacles.
Meta wants its AR glasses to be all-day devices like its Ray-Bans, but it probably needs to cut the weight down another ounce if possible. Still, it's on the way there.
The other issue, which Meta readily acknowledged, is that the Orion glasses' resolution and color fidelity need work.
Nick describes the Meta AR glasses' holographic layer as having a "rainbow shimmer," like the screen protector over a phone display before you peel it off. It's not overwhelming and doesn't cause any warping; it's just a slight discoloration. But it'd likely feel distracting if you had that filtering your view all day.
Playing the pong demo made it clear to Nick that AR gaming falls short of the quality you get with Quest 3 mixed reality passthrough. It can be hard to follow fast-moving objects, and things planted in the world don't look as real at Orion's current resolution.
But again, that feels like something Meta has years to improve on before its consumer version. Plus, since the display already runs at 90Hz—something the team says it's very happy with—it already meets expectations set by headsets like the Meta Quest 3.
Meta claims augmented reality glasses "might be the most challenging consumer electronics device produced since the smartphone."
Smart glasses have become more popular, but the successful ones with AR functionality are essentially extended displays. You plug them in to watch movies or play video games on a virtual, flat 100-inch screen while laying in bed or sitting on an airplane, with your phone trackpad for controls.
No one has figured out portability, or making hand tracking viable for primary controls, or any of the other considerations necessary for AR glasses to be worn outdoors on a daily basis, the way people envisioned when Google Glass first launched. However, Meta Orion does all of these things as closely as we've seen to the sci-fi concept yet.
Even though Meta's AR glasses have problems, they feel like they've come closest to that vision. The Meta Quest hand tracking and mixed reality software are a perfect fit for AR glasses. Meta AI based on Llama is only getting smarter, and they've solved at least two classic AR problems: the narrow FoV and short-lived battery. Now we just have to hope they keep on this path and improve in other areas.
