Display-equipped AI smart glasses are finally gaining traction. I tested Meta's first attempt, the $799 Ray-Ban Display, which features a full-color waveguide in-lens display that can show walking directions, live captions and translations, text messages, photos, and more. It works with an innovative Neural Band that allows for gesture controls, so you don't have to tap the glasses themselves. The hardware is excellent, but it's limited by Meta's first-party ecosystem focus, preventing it from being truly groundbreaking. For broader functionality, the Even Realities G2 ($599) is a better choice. Otherwise, it's worth waiting to see how Android XR shapes the market.
I hope you like the look of the Wayfarer-style Meta Ray-Ban glasses, because the Meta Ray-Ban Display is more of the same. The plastic frames (available in black or sand) have the same rectangular lens shape, flat front, and integrated saddle bridge, but they’re noticeably bulkier and have a glossy finish rather than matte. At 2.47 ounces, they’re also heavier than other AI glasses; the non-Display Wayfarers are 1.87 ounces, the Rokid Glasses are 1.73 ounces, and the cameraless Even G2 is a featherlight 1.27 ounces. That said, the heft fits the chunkiness of the frames, and it isn’t unwieldy.
A friend diplomatically described the design as “a choice.” I haven’t gotten that kind of reaction from any other smart glasses before. All the other pairs I've tested have passed as ordinary eyewear without a problem. I wouldn’t call these ugly, but they look a bit like costume “nerd” glasses, or a caricature of Ray-Bans.
The temples are mounted on spring hinges and have typical thin, slightly curved ear hooks. Combined with the integrated saddle bridge and its almost flush rubber nose pads, the glasses at least feel very natural and comfortable. A touch strip sits on the right temple and provides limited physical controls: tapping to play, pause, or skip music tracks, and activating Meta AI with a long press.
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The included faux-leather case keeps the glasses charged with a touch of style. Two flaps open to let the case almost unfold, exposing a T-shaped plastic lever that holds the frames in place at the nose bridge, keeping them aligned for consistent charging. A USB-C port sits on the right end of the case, with an indicator LED next to it.
In many ways, the Meta Ray-Ban Display's titular display is the best of its class. It uses a waveguide projection system, which means microprojectors in the frame send light directly through the lens, where an etched pattern, called a waveguide, bounces it into your eye through one lens. The lens is completely transparent when not showing a picture and doesn't significantly obstruct your view even when it's projecting something.
The trade-off of waveguide projection systems versus the bulkier prism-based alternatives found in many other AR glasses is a narrow field of view, relatively low resolution, and, usually, a monochrome green image instead of color. Situated in the right lens, the Ray-Ban Display's 600-by-600 monocular display is full color, putting it ahead of the green-only Even G1, G2, and Rokid Glasses. It enables an interface filled with blues, reds, purples, whites, grays, and greens. The color isn't particularly vibrant, but it's still much more pleasant to look at than monochrome green alternatives resembling early-'80s CRT monitors. The display is bright and sharp enough to show graphical interface elements like icons, diagrams, and even small photos and videos.
Its biggest weakness is its field of view. At 20 degrees, it's narrower than the Even G2's 27.5 degrees and the Rokid's 30 degrees, which themselves are small compared with prism-based AR glasses like the RayNeo Air 3s Pro (46 degrees) and the XReal One Pro (57 degrees). To Meta's credit, the 20-degree field of view doesn't feel small, since its square aspect ratio has a higher resolution than the rectangular displays of the Air 3s Pro (640 by 480) and One Pro (640 by 350). It might take up less real estate in front of your eye, but it can show more information.
Most interaction with the Meta Ray-Ban Display is through the included Neural Band controller. It’s a dark gray fabric wristband lined with eight capsule-like sensors that can recognize hand gestures by detecting muscle movements through your arm. It’s meant to be worn a few inches lower on your forearm than a watch, and I can wear it and my Pixel Watch 3 on my right arm at the same time. It’s comfortable, unobtrusive, and closes securely thanks to both a small buckle and a magnetic tab that makes it feel kind of like a slap bracelet. The band is waterproof with an IPX7 rating, meaning it can withstand most conditions, including swimming. Just don’t bring the actual glasses into the pool because they’re rated IPX4, which is only lightly water-resistant.
Using the Neural Band to control the glasses is as simple as tapping and rubbing your fingers together. With the band on your arm, tap your thumb to the tip of your index finger to select an item on the in-lens display, and tap your thumb to your middle finger to go back from the menu layer or app you’re in. Double-tap your thumb and middle finger to bring up the display or put it to sleep. Swipe your thumb across the side of your index finger to navigate through menus. Pinch your thumb and index finger together and rotate your wrist left or right like you’re turning a knob to adjust volume. And, if you want to use Meta AI without saying the wake word, you can double-tap your thumb to the side of your index finger (but you’ll still have to speak after that). For all of these gestures, the Neural Band will vibrate gently to let you know it’s detecting an input.
This is easily one of the best control systems I’ve seen on waveguide display smart glasses. Of course, every other remotely similar pair of smart glasses I’ve used has relied on limited and often unwieldy touch controls on the frames themselves (and the touch controls on the Meta Ray-Ban Display’s temple aren’t exactly useful, either). The Even G2 comes close with the optional R1 smart ring, which provides a more convenient and easier-to-use touch surface, but that’s an $249 accessory not included with the glasses.
I found it easy to get used to the Neural Band, and it was mostly responsive and accurate in testing. It consistently detected my finger taps and horizontal thumb swipes, though it often took a few tries to register vertical swipes to navigate up or down in menus. The dial-twist gesture was also a bit hit-or-miss. This isn’t the precise hand-tracking that mixed reality headsets like the Apple Vision Pro and Samsung Galaxy XR can do on their own without a wearable band, but they’re much larger and much more expensive devices you generally wouldn’t be walking around wearing.
The visual interface of the Meta Ray-Ban Display is a clean, colorful, well-labeled menu system that leverages four-directional navigation via the Neural Band. For comparison, every other pair of waveguide glasses I’ve tried before this has only offered single-axis scrolling menus because of the limited inputs. Meta's interface on the glasses is easy to use, but it’s laid out strangely.
The home view consists of three tabs. The center tab is for notifications and Meta AI, but most of the time it will just be a bar that says “Ask Meta AI.” That’s because the notifications on the glasses are so limited, which I’ll go into more detail about in the next section. From here, you can tap the Meta AI bar and ask a question from this tab, but you can also just say, “Hey Meta," or double-tap your thumb to the side of your index finger, and the glasses will start listening for a command. The tab feels superfluous since it doesn’t really have any functions to navigate visually, and you’re going to be talking to the AI when you activate it anyway.
The left tab is a more useful settings and quick-features menu. Here, there are buttons to immediately start live captioning or translating, open the camera tool to take photos or videos, and open the Music app, which displays whatever is playing on your phone and lets you play, pause, rewind, or skip tracks. The tab also has Volume and Brightness dials you can adjust by selecting either of them and performing the knob-turning gesture, as well as buttons to toggle audio-only and do-not-disturb modes. It also offers access to a dedicated, limited settings menu with two options: tilting the display slightly left or right for comfort, and configuring whether message notifications wake the display when it’s off.
On the right tab is the full app list, with buttons that open WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, calls, the camera, live captioning and translating, Maps, the music player, an on-glasses photo gallery, text messages, and tutorials. The app list doesn’t seem to be arranged in any logical order besides putting Meta’s own apps at the top by default, and you can’t rearrange them directly, which is frustrating. You can, however, pin the apps you use most and unpin the ones you don’t, so there’s at least some control.
The interface isn’t hard to learn, but it makes some awkward choices. The Quick Settings tab and the Notifications/Meta AI tab could have been combined. It would have been better to place the captioning, camera, and music buttons below the AI button, rather than in the settings tab, for easy access outside the apps tab. Phone functions like calls and text messages could also have been moved to a quick menu in the AI tab. There aren’t a ton of apps to scroll through, but that leads to one of the glasses’ biggest problems.
The Meta Ray-Ban Display is built around using Meta’s services and, if possible, only Meta’s services. The AI is Meta AI, the messaging apps outside of phone text messages are Messenger and WhatsApp, the photo-sharing app is Instagram, and those are the only choices you get (and they are all owned by Meta). You can’t talk to Gemini, message over Discord or Slack, or post photos on Bluesky. You can connect your Amazon Music, Shazam, and Spotify accounts, but that’s probably because Meta doesn’t have its own music streaming service. Even without them, you can at least control any audio playing on your phone through the glasses’ Music app, as if it were a widget on your lock screen.
Notifications are the biggest issue. Text messages and voice calls through your phone are supported, and you’ll get notifications for them. But those, and messages from Meta apps, are the only notifications the glasses will show. Unlike every other pair of waveguide smart glasses I’ve tested, these won't read your phone’s push notifications.
In addition, all of the Meta apps, including Instagram, are primarily for communication, not for browsing your social feeds. The Instagram app only brings you to your messages, so you can’t browse stories, and Facebook isn’t on the glasses at all.
Calendar support is also limited. There’s no dedicated calendar app, so you have to ask Meta AI to tell you what your appointments are. You can link your Google or Outlook calendars to your phone, but not if they’re work accounts with any kind of managed IT security. And you have to speak every time you want to check your next meeting.
I had initially planned to take the glasses to CES and write an account of covering the show with them. I didn’t, because the inability to see incoming Slack messages meant I couldn’t use the glasses to keep up with coverage discussions. Moreover, since my Google-based work calendar is protected by IT policies, I couldn’t ask Meta when or where I needed to go next for my many appointments. Simply supporting push notifications from third-party apps on my phone would have solved both of those problems on the Meta glasses. That feature is available on the Even Realities G2, which I ended up taking to CES instead.
If you’re a regular Meta user and the software limitations don’t bother you, the Meta Ray-Ban Display generally works quite well in executing its main functions. Closed captions are quick and accurate most of the time, and the text is easy to read. All AI-powered voice transcription depends on good sound quality, so it can make mistakes if the speech isn’t completely clear or if there’s significant background noise, but even then, it’s still very usable.
Translation is also effective, within its very limited scope. I watched some Spanish-language soccer programming on my TV, and the glasses translated it into English with surprising accuracy. They can likely do the same with French or Italian. Those are the only options, though, and that’s paltry compared with the Even G2 (31 languages) and the Rokid Glasses (89 languages). There’s no Chinese, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, or Vietnamese. Visual translation of other languages is supported using the camera, but not voice.
You’ll have to commit to one language at a time for the glasses to translate. The translation function on the glasses interface doesn’t offer any language choices and relies on the app to load a single language pack, a process that can take half a minute.
These are the first smart glasses I’ve used where the navigation feature is genuinely useful and provides a readable map. Opening the Maps app on the glasses pops up a large, easily understandable map of your location. Only a few major streets are labeled, but notable locations nearby, like movie theaters, are displayed as pins, and you can use the knob-turn gesture to zoom in closer for additional landmarks. From this view, you can use voice dictation to search for a location, or tap buttons for nearby cafes, restaurants, parks, or attractions. Selecting a destination will display the route as a blue line. From that view, you can start navigation, send the location to your phone, or, if it’s a business with a phone number, call it. I found the navigation to be direct and accurate, with the map view tracking my location and orientation as it gave me turn-by-turn directions.
The Music app is simple, with only track forward, track back, and play/pause buttons, plus a tile showing the time on the track. You'll also see album art if it's available and the app is compatible. No art came through my Android phone using Pocket Casts or YouTube Music, whereas both show album art and podcast icons on the phone itself. As mentioned, its phone widget-like universality also means it can control any audio playing from your phone. However, it doesn’t offer the same benefits as a phone widget because it only shows those controls when the app is open and on the display. An icon in the quick settings menu shows you the track playing, but to do anything with it, you have to tap it to open the app first. An in-glasses widget for the app to help populate the central tab would have been really helpful here, rather than requiring you to open its full view.
You can play/pause and skip tracks with single and double taps on the touch strip on the glasses, but that’s all you get for audio gesture support. The Neural Band doesn’t give you any audio controls or even provide a shortcut to bring up the Music app quickly. This is baffling because the Meta AI app lets you assign the double-tap gesture to “your favorite feature,” but the only options are the default Meta AI activation or disabling it completely.
Audio quality is pretty good for smart glasses. The speakers on the temples produce fairly robust sound that can be easily heard even in a crowded, noisy coffee shop. There’s little bass to speak of, but that’s just a reality for smart glasses that have a physical gap between their small speaker drivers and your ear canal.
Don’t expect any privacy for what you’re listening to, though; sound leakage is significant, and anyone near you will be able to hear whatever’s playing if it’s higher than half volume, which is the floor for comfortable listening on your end in most situations.
The built-in camera seems to be the same as the one on the second-generation non-Display Meta Ray-Ban glasses. It can shoot 12MP photos or capture 3K video in vertical orientation. Captures are colorful and fairly sharp for smart glasses, with fine detail like my cat’s fur coming through clearly. Noise can soften pictures in low light, but in a fairly unobtrusive way. You won’t likely notice it if you view or post your full capture, but you won’t get much more detail out of them by zooming in. Basically, it’s good enough for social media and matches what we’ve seen from Meta’s other recent smart glasses.
Meta says the glasses themselves can last up to six hours with mixed use, and the charging case adds another 18 hours. It falls short of the Rokid Glasses' 8-hour battery life, but Rokid's charging case is a $99 accessory sold separately. While using the Meta glasses intermittently and tucking them into the charging case when not in use, I consistently saw all-day use with the battery meter seldom dropping below 50%.
The Neural Band can last up to 18 hours per charge.
The Meta Ray-Ban Display delivers some of the best hardware and controls you'll find in a pair of smart glasses, but its tightly closed software ecosystem makes it hard to recommend over more open alternatives.
Final Thoughts
(Credit: Will Greenwald)
Meta Ray-Ban Display
- 5.0 - Exemplary: Near perfection, ground-breaking
- 4.5 - Outstanding: Best in class, acts as a benchmark for measuring competitors
- 4.0 - Excellent: A performance, feature, or value leader in its class, with few shortfalls
- 3.5 - Good: Does what the product should do, and does so better than many competitors
- 3.0 - Average: Does what the product should do, and sits in the middle of the pack
- 2.5 - Fair: We have some reservations, buy with caution
- 2.0 - Subpar: We do not recommend, buy with extreme caution
- 1.5 - Poor: Do not buy this product
- 1.0 - Dismal: Don't even think about buying this product
Read Our Editorial Mission Statement and Testing Methodologies.
Meta's Ray-Ban Display is frustrating: It pairs excellent hardware and intuitive physical controls with an interface full of minor annoyances and features that favor Meta over usefulness. The display is the best I've seen on smart glasses, and the Neural Band is clever and easy to use, though not always accurate. Live captions are OK, translations are limited, and navigation is surprisingly good, with a genuinely usable map. If you live on Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp, and calls, the Ray-Ban Display might work well for you. But for apps like Bluesky, Discord, or Slack, it's almost useless. Overall, it's a Meta-centric mix of good electronics and missing functionality.
Waveguide AI glasses still need time to mature. If you want functional smart glasses that handle all notifications, the Even G2 is a better choice for $200 less. There's no Neural Band and its monochrome display lacks a camera, but it's more versatile and stylish, and it can be paired with an optional smart ring for touch control and basic health tracking.
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About Our Expert
I’m PCMag’s home theater and AR/VR expert, and your go-to source of information and recommendations for game consoles and accessories, smart displays, smart glasses, smart speakers, soundbars, TVs, and VR headsets. I’m an ISF-certified TV calibrator and THX-certified home theater technician, I've served as a CES Innovation Awards judge, and while Bandai hasn’t officially certified me, I’m also proficient at building Gundam plastic models up to MG-class. I also enjoy genre fiction writing, and my urban fantasy novel, Alex Norton, Paranormal Technical Support, is currently available on Amazon.
