Snap co-founder and CEO Evan Spiegel has publicly launched 'Specs', his company's latest foray into the camera glasses market. They come nearly ten years after the company's original camera glasses, but this time things are different. It isn't a device to record content for your Snap Chat. This is a new operating system without keyboard or mouse, aiming to show both Meta and Apple what they did wrong.
The launch began with perhaps the most surreal 170 seconds ever, before we get onto the practical details – including a heavy note that the glasses – which very definitey do feature a camera – "can understand the world without recording it." So what is happening here?
So, as we've discussed already at DCW, the idea of a camera worn as sunglasses has been very popular and, more recently, has come under so much criticism that there is now a prospect of Meta glasses without a camera.
Specs will still have a camera, which they can even use to percieve the world in 3D and create 3D shopping experiences, as well as take images for SnapChat, so will they be in for just as much criticism?
Not according to Spiegel, who points out that the significantly more expensive and capable devices are so big "You can see them from a mile away," so they wouldn't be a choice for creeps. There is also a flashing LED, as per Meta's glasses.
The photo-taking process in the demo was also not as discreet – with a finger-clicking gesture that also left an arm and hand very much in the frame. Image capture is able to take advantage of a four-camera system (dual optical, dual IR).
Other sources say that the system can record video as well as photos for limited periods – in 'capture mode'. That, however, is broadly true of Meta's system, and has not silenced worries.
We were told, in the launch presentation, that the glasses have an alien as a mascot because (and you have to bear with this) the company had meetings. In them, they imagined aliens looking down at humanity, wondering why we walk around with our heads in little glowing rectangles all day, plugging them in to feed them electricity, and buying the rectangles outfits (like the best iPhone 18 Pro cases), and doing whatever the rectangles wished.
Ultimately, the aliens – in Spiegel's story – the aliens sent Specs as gift to humanity to help us all.
Nothing arrogant about that sentiment in a product launch! And some will also wonder whether a 'gift' can cost $2,195 / £1,999 a throw (and a little more for the cellular-capable version).
If that sounds a bit of a stretch to experience the tech, you can try the device's A.I. helper, Specs Intelligence, for free. You need an iPhone or a Mac to download the app from the App Store.
There are limitations. Specs are only capable of about 4 hours use – even when some of that is audio. The solution is a charging case to carry on the move.
We also don't know what the dual Snapdragon processors can deliver in a device that weighs 136g; interestingly, there was no specific mention of image stabilization though presumably something is needed to align the overlaid 3D graphics.
The glasses are nonetheless very impressive, with the option of dimming the 'glass' to act more like a private world, or operating as a head-up display like traditionally see-through glasses. That display has a 51-degree field of view (equivalent to standing ten feet from a 115-inch TV).
The glasses will ship this fall, and demos will begin in public in the coming months, first at Los Angeles Westfield, then at some Verizon stores in the USA and EE stores in the UK.
In the meantime check our guides to the best camera glasses for more traditional wearable tech, while Apple Vision Pro cuts back on parts orders.
