Ray-Ban Meta Review: The Best Camera Glasses Have a People Problem
As hardware, they are the most polished smart glasses you can buy. As a social object, they are complicated.
By Nadia Pike · 16 October 2023
Pros
- Genuinely good camera and audio
- Looks like normal eyewear
- Easy capture
Cons
- Privacy optics for bystanders
- No display
- Meta account required
Ray-Ban Meta is the rare smart-glasses product that succeeds as a pair of glasses first. Since the September 2023 launch at $299, the frames look and wear like the Wayfarers they are based on, and that is most of the battle.
The capture is the draw: a 12MP camera, 1080p video, crisp open-ear speakers and the Meta AI assistant on voice command. For creators and one-handed memory-grabbing, nothing else is this frictionless.
The catch is everyone else. There is no display, so all the intelligence is audio and capture, and a camera on the face changes how a room reads you. We dock points not for what the product does but for the trust it quietly asks of the people around the wearer.
FieldLens verdict: the best camera glasses on the market, recommended with eyes open about the social bargain you are making.
The facts
The second-generation Ray-Ban Meta glasses launched on 27 September 2023 from $299, adding a 12MP camera, 1080p video, open-ear speakers and the Meta AI assistant.