Is anybody making smart glasses that are just a display? For me, the rest of the feature set verges on being anti-features. I'd much rather a very rudimentary display that my phone or another device could send relatively low bandwidth data to over bluetooth or some other protocol and build from there.
Having a camera or a mic on the glasses themselves seems like something I'd mostly want to avoid for privacy, and having a speaker just seems like gilding the lily when we already have a variety of headphones to choose from.
You can send low-resolution images to them via Bluetooth. I just figured out how to read button presses. There are speakers and a mic, but I haven't figured out how to use them yet (they don't show up as regular audio devices on Linux).
You'd need to write custom stuff to generate the images, but with a little imagemagick scripting I've had some pretty usable results.
Personally I want to see something that isn't dependant on a depleting level of stock, ideally something open source. Otherwise the development investment just doesn't seem worth it.
Note that Solos smart glass from one of other comments might be on eBay for $49 each, but they used to be $499 new. Even Realities G1 is $599. Vufine was way cheaper at $199, but it was wired only and it came with no software whatsoever.
Smart glasses inevitably cost in those ranges because the exotic displays used on them are costly to make and/or operate. Inkjet OLED on silicon or reflexive monochrome LCD with RGB sequential front lighting combined with a prism system or things of that nature.
IOW, those excessive feature sets isn't drawn from product concepts or user stories, they're drawn backwards from cumulative parts and engineering costs to justify MSRP. Same reasons as why almost all EVs are marketed as premium products, they can't make them cheaply so they're adding extra glitters in paint to justify price tags.
If anyone could make displays smaller than a pinky fingernail at $5 that can be driven with an Arduino... then there would be lots of smart glasses that are just Bluetooth picture frames.
This rings true to me -- it's hard to sell a $480 device that only displays images. Easier to sell a $500 device that is a $480 display + $20 of crappy software and sensors and speakers and compute so that buyers think they're getting their money's worth.
Not quite "smart glasses", but if you want "glasses that are just a display", the Lenovo Legion Glasses are pretty good and they look like normal aviators at first glance.
I have a pair and I've been experimenting a bit.
For iOS you can mirror display or use Stage Manager. For Android, at least with Samsung, DEX is pretty decent.
For audio, they're decent too, I like the convenience and comfort. The audio has good fidelity, but depth is mediocre (better than phone speakers though).
FWIW I say DEX is decent, having much of the same gripes as I do with Stage Manager. Dual screen, resizing windows, and full screen support is still a mixed bag on all mobile devices. It can be very frustrating at times. Application support on iOS and Android is about the same, which is disappointing. Supposedly iOS 26 fixes some of this, but I haven't tried the beta.
It’s wired and very finicky. Basically a 10 year old solution to this problem. I have on in my collection. It’s cool but not really useful or in same tier as the other products being mentioned.’
Viture similarly offers wired USB-c displayport, with myopia adjustment up to -5 diopters, and optional magnetic frame for custom prescriptions. They sell refurbs on eBay and have a Linux SDK. It's surprisingly functional as a mirrored monitor, without the additional software or hardware which adds platform-specific features like virtual monitors.
ever since reading the opening chapter of Charles Stross' Accelerando, this is what I've wanted.. an always present live information feed available on tap at any time.
To be honest most of my apps are web pages now. Even on my phone I do not use any more than the default apps. For what is missing I have written my own self-hosted pages.
I sometimes wonder why people "synchronize" anything, since everything is in my self-hosted instance.
It would be difficult to do head tracking without a camera and having it fixed in your view would limit what you could do with it and be distracting I think (depends on the use case/person though)
Because smart glasses, that flash a light and make a loud noise when taking a picture, are more invasive than phones literally everywhere? Or street billboards with built in cameras?
Or how about dash cams in cars? CCTV cameras on ATMs as you walk down the street?
Reframe this to accommodate for the prevalence and general expectations of where cameras exist.
Many people walk around with a mobile device out, essentially carrying a device with (increasingly) close to a 360 camera view. Cameras are ubiquitous and targeting one niche device is a waste of time and effort.
I have Rayban Metas and the hardware is great...but the software borders on being unhelpful. If they merely served a dumb camera and bluetooth headset to my phone they'd be an unbelievably good product.
Meta won't do this because they want to capture _everything_ going on, but I don't want to chat with Meta's AI, it is very bad, I want to chat with Gemini or ChatGPT and I can do so with their glasses but I must initiate that on my phone (Meta won't give you wakewords for OpenAI/Google of course).
So my suggestion here would be don't? There is no need for an app store or anything like that, just the thinest software layer you need to make the sunglass hardware work as a dumb bluetooth headset and remote camera for the user's phone.
How do the glasses serve as a "dumb camera to your phone"? What protocol do they use to do this? It doesn't exist. It's something that must be solved at the OS layer.
What if you want to use multiple apps? Are you going to spend 2 minutes each time disconnecting Bluetooth from one phone app, connecting to another, and then using it? No, you need to runtime that lets multiple apps access the sensors as needed.
Do you want to make an app that accesses the microphone? If you want to have translation app running at the same time that you're taking notes, then again you need some way to allow multiple apps to run at once.
"How do the glasses serve as a "dumb camera to your phone"? What protocol do they use to do this? It doesn't exist. It's something that must be solved at the OS layer."
No, Snapchat did this just fine in the software layer with their glasses looooooong ago.
> How do the glasses serve as a "dumb camera to your phone"? What protocol do they use to do this? It doesn't exist. It's something that must be solved at the OS layer.
USB webcams have been a thing for years ;)
I have a pair of Xreal glasses and, while they don’t have a camera, they do have the other components. They are entirely dumb. You plug the USB cable into your phone/laptop/portable gaming device and that’s literally it.
The cable runs discreetly from the back of the ear and has the additional benefit that you don’t need a heavy battery built into the frame of the glasses.
So you definitely can have a XR glasses that are “dumb”.
"How do the glasses serve as a dumb camera to the phone": just like a USB camera. USB protocol, or USBIP. "yeah, but what OS" - what OS does a USB webcam need to be a USB webcam? That OS.
"What if you want to use multiple apps?" for a headset that's a window to a phone, you see the phone screen, the phone handles multitasking. Want to switch between apps? Then switch between apps on your phone, and you see the result.
"Do you want to make an app that accesses the microphone?" again, the phone does it. What OS do my bluetooth earphones run to be accessible from my phone?
I agree with what the person you're responding to wants: just an screen/audio interface with my phone. MentraOS is obviously not* aiming to be that, otherwise it wouldn't have any apps at all, especially not things like a "notes" app or any other app I already have on my phone.
The issue is as soon as you start trying to build an app ecosystem, you inevitably create the sort of opportunities business loves to exploit, and then all of a sudden I've got another layer for big tech to try extract stuff from me, when all I wanted was to be able to see my phone screen without having my phone directly in front of me - as someone who uses apps rather than develops them, I don't need another app store or more apps!
*Edit: having read some of their work culture, and the people involved, this isn't a project that's intended to be owned by humans, this is going to become the worst kind of big tech, or nothing.
This comment reminds me of a simple `esp32` project I saw recently that lets you send your LLM requests via SMS. It basically offloads everything. Particularly useful when you don't have a decent data connection, but can still send SMS.
META wants to be the Android of smart glasses because they know it will be the next dominate form factor when we have desirable devices (also why they are starting with less hardware but a form factor people feel comfortable wearing in public)
Android XR is coming out with Moohan next month, if Visor ever comes out, it is believed that will eventually by on AXR. Apple still seems hobbled since Jobs left
It is hard for me to swallow the promise of smart glasses and I was dev-ing for the original Google glass.
It's awkward, battery life is a pittance, the display can be useful but only in select cases. Controls are always an issue. LLMs won't actually fix that - voice control is not the answer.
I was about to make the exact same comment. But then I remembered that there are billions of people who buy products advertised on Facebook and TikTok because it's "cool" and "fun". So what do I know about the future of smart glasses OS? Probably nothing.
Not really, despite the repo being named MentraOS, this repo seems to include only some mobile apps (that either run on a phone or on the glasses), some server code, and some SDKs.
Mentra glasses are likely running on a fork of AOSP, which is not in this repo.
Live translation is something I've been dreaming about since Google Glass. I just want translation, subtitles, turn by turn directions, and ad blocking.
The idea of ad blocking with smart glasses kind of freaks me out. I'll take additive but I don't want subtractive reality where parts of the world are being hidden from me.
Even Realities G1 glasses, which support Mentra, will do the first 2. The 3rd is partial, not quite turn by turn, but you can see a map around you with them on
We're also looking to support the Brilliant Labs Halo glasses once they release later this year.
Regarding Ray-Bans: We'd love to support those, but the Ray-Bans are extremely locked down. Nobody has found a jailbreak yet. We're always open to support more glasses provided they're all-day wearable and have an SDK.
I remember trying an early pair of smart glasses years ago and feeling let down because nothing worked beyond the demo apps. Seeing MentraOS now makes me think this could finally be the moment where smart glasses start to feel like real everyday devices.
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Having a camera or a mic on the glasses themselves seems like something I'd mostly want to avoid for privacy, and having a speaker just seems like gilding the lily when we already have a variety of headphones to choose from.
You can send low-resolution images to them via Bluetooth. I just figured out how to read button presses. There are speakers and a mic, but I haven't figured out how to use them yet (they don't show up as regular audio devices on Linux).
You'd need to write custom stuff to generate the images, but with a little imagemagick scripting I've had some pretty usable results.
Personally I want to see something that isn't dependant on a depleting level of stock, ideally something open source. Otherwise the development investment just doesn't seem worth it.
Smart glasses inevitably cost in those ranges because the exotic displays used on them are costly to make and/or operate. Inkjet OLED on silicon or reflexive monochrome LCD with RGB sequential front lighting combined with a prism system or things of that nature.
IOW, those excessive feature sets isn't drawn from product concepts or user stories, they're drawn backwards from cumulative parts and engineering costs to justify MSRP. Same reasons as why almost all EVs are marketed as premium products, they can't make them cheaply so they're adding extra glitters in paint to justify price tags.
If anyone could make displays smaller than a pinky fingernail at $5 that can be driven with an Arduino... then there would be lots of smart glasses that are just Bluetooth picture frames.
https://github.com/Mentra-Community/MentraOS/blob/main/glass...
https://www.evenrealities.com/g1
https://www.vuzix.com/products/z100-smart-glasses
https://global.rokid.com/
Both of these companies make exactly that. I have Rokid Max, can't comment on the quality for the Xreal
I have a pair and I've been experimenting a bit.
For iOS you can mirror display or use Stage Manager. For Android, at least with Samsung, DEX is pretty decent.
For audio, they're decent too, I like the convenience and comfort. The audio has good fidelity, but depth is mediocre (better than phone speakers though).
FWIW I say DEX is decent, having much of the same gripes as I do with Stage Manager. Dual screen, resizing windows, and full screen support is still a mixed bag on all mobile devices. It can be very frustrating at times. Application support on iOS and Android is about the same, which is disappointing. Supposedly iOS 26 fixes some of this, but I haven't tried the beta.
The microphone lets you pick up voice, which is critical. Captions, translation, note-taking, etc. all benefit from this.
Even Realities G1 is this. Mentra is releasing a pair in first half of 2026 like this. Display + microphone.
ever since reading the opening chapter of Charles Stross' Accelerando, this is what I've wanted.. an always present live information feed available on tap at any time.
I sometimes wonder why people "synchronize" anything, since everything is in my self-hosted instance.
Or how about dash cams in cars? CCTV cameras on ATMs as you walk down the street?
Many people walk around with a mobile device out, essentially carrying a device with (increasingly) close to a 360 camera view. Cameras are ubiquitous and targeting one niche device is a waste of time and effort.
it is called smart glasses when its just "glasses" ???
I have Rayban Metas and the hardware is great...but the software borders on being unhelpful. If they merely served a dumb camera and bluetooth headset to my phone they'd be an unbelievably good product.
Meta won't do this because they want to capture _everything_ going on, but I don't want to chat with Meta's AI, it is very bad, I want to chat with Gemini or ChatGPT and I can do so with their glasses but I must initiate that on my phone (Meta won't give you wakewords for OpenAI/Google of course).
So my suggestion here would be don't? There is no need for an app store or anything like that, just the thinest software layer you need to make the sunglass hardware work as a dumb bluetooth headset and remote camera for the user's phone.
How do the glasses serve as a "dumb camera to your phone"? What protocol do they use to do this? It doesn't exist. It's something that must be solved at the OS layer.
What if you want to use multiple apps? Are you going to spend 2 minutes each time disconnecting Bluetooth from one phone app, connecting to another, and then using it? No, you need to runtime that lets multiple apps access the sensors as needed.
Do you want to make an app that accesses the microphone? If you want to have translation app running at the same time that you're taking notes, then again you need some way to allow multiple apps to run at once.
MentraOS solves those problems.
No, Snapchat did this just fine in the software layer with their glasses looooooong ago.
USB webcams have been a thing for years ;)
I have a pair of Xreal glasses and, while they don’t have a camera, they do have the other components. They are entirely dumb. You plug the USB cable into your phone/laptop/portable gaming device and that’s literally it.
The cable runs discreetly from the back of the ear and has the additional benefit that you don’t need a heavy battery built into the frame of the glasses.
So you definitely can have a XR glasses that are “dumb”.
"What if you want to use multiple apps?" for a headset that's a window to a phone, you see the phone screen, the phone handles multitasking. Want to switch between apps? Then switch between apps on your phone, and you see the result.
"Do you want to make an app that accesses the microphone?" again, the phone does it. What OS do my bluetooth earphones run to be accessible from my phone?
I agree with what the person you're responding to wants: just an screen/audio interface with my phone. MentraOS is obviously not* aiming to be that, otherwise it wouldn't have any apps at all, especially not things like a "notes" app or any other app I already have on my phone.
The issue is as soon as you start trying to build an app ecosystem, you inevitably create the sort of opportunities business loves to exploit, and then all of a sudden I've got another layer for big tech to try extract stuff from me, when all I wanted was to be able to see my phone screen without having my phone directly in front of me - as someone who uses apps rather than develops them, I don't need another app store or more apps!
*Edit: having read some of their work culture, and the people involved, this isn't a project that's intended to be owned by humans, this is going to become the worst kind of big tech, or nothing.
edit: found it https://www.reddit.com/r/arduino/comments/1n7r3vl/a_textbot_...
Android XR is coming out with Moohan next month, if Visor ever comes out, it is believed that will eventually by on AXR. Apple still seems hobbled since Jobs left
It's awkward, battery life is a pittance, the display can be useful but only in select cases. Controls are always an issue. LLMs won't actually fix that - voice control is not the answer.
https://docs.mentra.glass/contributing
https://github.com/Mentra-Community/MentraOS
There's a Black Mirror episode on that (and more), S2E4 White Christmas.
I’ll make an exception for ad blocking as long as there’s a visual marker where the ad was.
Ad blocking - we'll need a research team and 5 years https://xkcd.com/1425/
The possibility of shooting ads directly into the retina is probably the main driving force behind smart glasses.
Except it seems they only run on Mentra glasses. Not Meta Ray-Bans, Echo Frames, or any of the many other existing smart glasses platforms.
https://github.com/Mentra-Community/MentraOS/blob/main/glass...
We're also looking to support the Brilliant Labs Halo glasses once they release later this year.
Regarding Ray-Bans: We'd love to support those, but the Ray-Bans are extremely locked down. Nobody has found a jailbreak yet. We're always open to support more glasses provided they're all-day wearable and have an SDK.
Show HN: Sheet Music in Smart Glasses - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43906442 - May 2025 (25 comments)