The smart eyewear collab wars are heating up
Why Google, Meta, Samsung, Snap, and others are racing to own the future of wearable eyewear
Something is happening on your face.
And this time, it is not just about fashion. It’s about the future of computing.
In 2025, big tech is teaming up with optical giants and hardware specialists to make smart glasses not just viable, but desirable.
These are not experiments or prototypes. They are real consumer products backed by real strategy. And the players involved are not playing small.
The smart eyewear battleground
Here is the new landscape shaping up in front of our eyes:
Google’s full-stack strategy
Google is covering every angle. Its $100 million investment in Gentle Monster brings aesthetic credibility and cult design appeal.
Its partnership with Warby Parker opens up the direct-to-consumer market. Kering Eyewear (behind Gucci, Saint Laurent, and more) offers a luxury tier. And its ongoing alliance with Samsung and Qualcomm forms the technical backbone for Android XR.
Together, this creates a layered smart glasses play: from affordable and wearable, to premium and bold. All powered by Gemini AI. All ready for consumers by 2026.
Meta’s optical empire
Meta continues to double down through EssilorLuxottica. The success of the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses took many by surprise, which gives Meta a great head start and some solid foundations to build on from.
They have since already followed up with the introduction of the upgraded and sportier Oakley Meta HSTN, with a Prada collaboration on the horizon. The future is looking bright for Meta and wearables.
Where Google spreads across tiers, Meta goes deep.
Ray-Ban provides fashion-forward mainstream reach.
Oakley adds utility and performance.
Prada signals luxury and culture.
Meta AI ties it all together.
This is before we even go in to Project Orion which we’ll cover off further in a future edition.
Samsung and Qualcomm: powering the platforms
Samsung is not just collaborating with Google. They are building their own products too. The Haean smart glasses are ultra-thin and designed for everyday use.
Project Moohan, its joint AR effort with Google, is aimed squarely at the premium headset and glasses category.
Qualcomm also provides the underlying chips and platforms.
The Snapdragon AR1 and XR2 are already embedded in Meta’s smart glasses and will likely power Google’s Android XR devices too.
Qualcomm is also exploring input innovations like smart rings and local AI demos, reinforcing its role as the infrastructure layer behind the scenes.
Snap stays experimental
Snap may not have retail muscle or big-name partners, but it continues to iterate for creators. It’s arguably got a potential sleeper hit on its hands with its upcoming sixth generation and has been doing it one of the longest but remains a smaller and more experimental outfit.
Snap Spectacles first came out in November 2016 initially through pop up vending machines in the US.
The Spectacles allowed people to record video to be shared on Snapchat and were then made available more widely for sale online in February 2017.
Its upcoming Specs AI are designed as open tools for developers and power users. While Google and Meta battle for mass adoption, Snap builds for niche influence.
Who else is in the game?
A few more players are circling the smart eyewear space, each with different angles and ambitions.
Apple
Apple is not in the glasses game yet, but it is coming. And when it does it’s going to likely set the bar.
After launching Vision Pro in 2024, sales numbers and take up have been lower than expectations and forecasts.
The high price and the sense of isolation when wearing a full headset has not helped with advancing their acceptability.
Apple is reportedly developing lightweight AR glasses as a long-term follow-up.
When it enters the category, it will likely do so with the same polish, design discipline, and cultural influence it brought to wearables with the Apple Watch. which we must not forgot took multiple years and interations to find its own product market fit.
Amazon
Amazon’s Echo Frames are now in their third generation. These are audio-only glasses with Alexa integration, focused on utility rather than AR or visual interfaces. While they lack cameras or displays, they reflect Amazon’s interest in ambient computing through wearable form factors.
Xreal (formerly Nreal)
Xreal is building lightweight tethered AR glasses for entertainment and gaming. Products like the Xreal Air are popular with tech enthusiasts and early adopters. While they do not yet have cultural or fashion credibility, they lead on immersive display quality and media consumption.
Others
Companies like Vuzix, Bosch, Lenovo, and TCL continue to build smart eyewear for enterprise and industrial use. These products rarely reach consumers, but they shape the hardware pipelines that consumer glasses will eventually draw from. Luxshare Precision, a key Apple supplier, is also rumoured to be working on AR components behind the scenes.
This time, it is not just tech
What makes this moment different is that these smart glasses are actually wearable.
They don’t look like developer kits. They look like glasses people would actually willingly choose to wear. And millions already are. That’s because every major tech player has brought in experts in taste, style, and cultural capital. The social norms are eroding.
This is not just a product race. It is a platform war. The winning smart glasses will not just be the smartest. They will be the most invisible ones that people just want to wear.
Ray-Ban has the biggest early head start here for Meta due to the form factor being familiar and inobtrusive. They will plan to use that halo effect to permeate other brands within the EssilorLuxottica umbrella.
Who’s next?
Here’s just a small sign of things to come for Meta and all the brands under one roof:
I’d love to see Alain Mikli, Burberry, Chanel, Ferrari, Moncler, Oliver Peoples, Persol and Polo Ralph Lauren all get the smart treatment.
TL;DR
Smart glasses are no longer a side project. They are a category.
Google is partnering with Gentle Monster, Warby Parker, and Kering for a full-tiered approach.
Meta is deepening its collaboration with EssilorLuxottica to push Ray-Ban, Oakley, and Prada into the wearable age.
Samsung and Qualcomm are powering the hardware layer behind Android XR.
Snap continues to experiment at the edge of creator culture.
Apple, Amazon, and Xreal are watching closely-or quietly preparing their own plays.
The future of computing is now one that you wear.
EVERYWEAR.