It has been widely reported that Apple is working on smart glasses to rival Meta’s blockbuster Ray-Bans, Oakleys, etc. But the details, including when they might arrive to market, have been fuzzy.
Until now, that is.
Bloomberg reports that Apple is planning to reveal its first smart glasses at the next Worldwide Developers Conference in June 2027, ahead of a consumer release by the end of that year.
That’s not when the device was supposed to launch, though. According to the report, Apple had been planning on rolling them out later this year, but engineering delays as well as privacy concerns led the folks in Cupertino to punt.
Putting cameras in eyewear comes with some drawbacks, it turns out. Apple is “developing features and policies”—and, naturally, marketing—to prioritize privacy in the wake of criticism that Meta isn’t doing nearly enough to prevent people from hijacking its pioneering smart glasses for nefarious purposes. (“Ban the pervert glasses,” reads many a social media post.)
That’s a problem because Meta has defined, and continues to define, the entire category—making Apple’s entry more fraught than usual.
(It’s not alone: The head of Samsung’s XR R&D group, James Choi, reportedly described public perception about smart glasses as a “shared industry problem,”
as CNET puts it.)
How might Apple solve the problem? On-device processing, no facial recognition, no continuously capturing sensors, and stringent protections for any content generated by the rumored device, according to Bloomberg.
But no solution is complete without a whole lot of reassurance that this product doesn’t violate
the assertion that “Apple products, including Apple Intelligence, are designed to protect your privacy, because privacy is a fundamental human right.” In other words: Keep your eyes peeled.
—AN
