Meta Connect 2025: Smart Glasses, Neural Interfaces, and the Future of Computing

Meta Connect 2025 has concluded with a clear message: the future of computing isn't just about screens—it's about seamlessly blending digital experiences into our physical world. This year's announcements centered heavily on smart glasses, neural interfaces, and AI-powered creation tools that signal Meta's ambitious vision for wearable computing.

Smart Glasses Take Center Stage

Ray-Ban Display AI Glasses: The Breakthrough

The standout announcement was the Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses, Meta's first consumer smart glasses with an integrated heads-up display. Priced at $799 and launching September 30, 2025, these glasses feature a high-resolution monocular display that's large enough to read text messages or watch small videos. The display is slightly offset to avoid disrupting your natural view and disappears after a few seconds when not in use.

At 42 pixels per degree (ppd), the display offers higher resolution than any of Meta's consumer VR headsets. With a custom light engine and waveguide delivering brightness up to 5,000 nits, the display remains visible both indoors and outdoors—even on bright, sunny days.

What makes these glasses truly unique is their control system through the included Meta Neural Band. This device uses surface electromyography (sEMG) to translate subtle finger and muscle movements into digital actions. You can send messages by making finger gestures, call contacts with minimal hand movements, or even "write" text by miming handwriting in midair.

The Neural Band offers 18 hours of battery life and is water-resistant, representing a major step toward screenless, context-aware interaction with digital devices. Together, the display glasses and neural interface represent a fundamentally different way to interact with technology.

Oakley Meta Vanguard: Built for Athletes

For the fitness-focused, Meta introduced the Oakley Meta Vanguard glasses, launching October 21 for $499. These performance AI glasses combine classic Oakley design with the durability to withstand high-intensity sports and rugged outdoor adventures.

The Vanguard glasses offer up to nine hours of mixed-use battery life and feature a centered camera with a wider 122-degree field of view. The 3K video recording includes stabilization specifically designed for activities like trail running or skiing. Two new capture modes—Hyperlapse and Slow Motion—allow athletes to document their adventures in creative ways.

The open-ear speakers are Meta's most powerful yet, six decibels louder than the Oakley Meta HSTN, with advanced wind noise reduction that performs well in winds up to 30mph. With an IP67 rating, these glasses are not only sweatproof but can withstand temporary submersion in up to a meter of water.

New integrations with Garmin and Strava through the Meta AI app provide real-time workout stats hands-free, with Meta AI delivering workout summaries to track progress over time. An innovative autocapture feature with Garmin automatically triggers video recording based on workout milestones—capturing footage when you hit a set distance or achieve a speed burst.

Enhanced Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 2)

The next generation of Ray-Ban Meta glasses launched with significant improvements, starting at $379. These feature up to 2x the battery life of their predecessor, offering up to eight hours of mixed use, along with ultra HD 3K video recording that more than doubles the previous pixel count.

A new "Conversation Focus" feature amplifies the voice of the person you're talking to in noisy environments, using the glasses' open-ear speakers to cut through background noise whether you're at a busy restaurant or catching a DJ set. This feature is also coming to existing Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley Meta HSTN glasses as a software update.

Meta is enhancing live AI capabilities, working toward transitioning Meta AI from a prompted assistant to an always-available companion. While technical challenges remain for all-day AI, users can currently access live AI for one to two hours of continuous use.

VR Gaming and Entertainment Lineup

Quest continues to expand its gaming library with several major titles launching this fall. ILM's Star Wars: Beyond Victory launches October 7 for Quest 3, followed by nDreams Elevation's Reach on October 16 for PC VR, PS VR2, and Quest platforms. Marvel's Deadpool VR arrives November 18, while Resolution Games' Demeo x Dungeons & Dragons: Battlemarked is set for Q4 2025.

Horizon Studio: AI-Powered World Building

Meta unveiled Horizon Studio, a new creation platform powered by the Meta Horizon Engine that replaces Unity as Meta's default VR engine. This represents a seismic shift for developers and creators. The new tools enable world-building and experience design through AI text prompts, dramatically democratizing VR content creation.

The Horizon Studio editor includes generative AI tools for instantly creating textures, sounds, and even NPC personalities. An AI assistant will be available in the editor later this year for hands-free creative control. These advances make VR content creation more accessible to creators who might not have traditional programming skills.

Hyperscape: Real Worlds, Virtual Experiences

The new "Hyperscape" technology represents a significant leap in bringing photorealistic spaces into VR. This technology enables users to scan spaces and recreate them as high-fidelity, photorealistic digital replicas—like stepping into a photograph.

Hyperscape Capture (Beta) is now rolling out gradually for Quest 3 and Quest 3S users 18 and older. The process is remarkably simple: scan your room in just a few minutes, then wait a few hours for processing to create an immersive, true-to-life digital replica that you can visit from anywhere. This represents Meta's first step toward "photorealistic social teleportation," where people can feel like they're physically present in remote locations.

Several featured Hyperscape worlds are already available for exploration, including Gordon Ramsay's home kitchen in LA, Chance the Rapper's House of Kicks with musical instruments and track listings, The Octagon at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, and Happy Kelli's colorful room filled with her Crocs collection. While these worlds are currently single-user experiences, social sharing capabilities are coming soon.

Enhanced Quest Platform

Quest headsets now launch into a fully refreshed Horizon Central home environment, seamlessly linking users with social spaces and live events like concerts and comedy shows. The new Meta Horizon Engine delivers 4x faster load times, supports up to 5x more users in a single world, and enables advanced photorealistic environments.

Additional Quest improvements include:

• Direct casting to external displays via USB-C for creators and multiplayer sessions
• Enhanced multitasking with up to three windows open while in VR content
• Improved family sharing features through the Meta Horizon app

Horizon TV: Entertainment Reimagined

Meta Horizon TV represents a comprehensive entertainment hub that aggregates major streaming services like Disney+, Hulu, ESPN, YouTube, Twitch, and Prime Video directly inside Quest headsets. The platform eliminates letterboxing by displaying media in correctly sized windows based on aspect ratio, ensuring an optimal viewing experience as directors originally intended.

The service launches with Dolby Atmos surround sound support, with Dolby Vision coming later this year for richer colors and spatial audio that surpasses traditional TV experiences. Exclusive partnerships with Universal Pictures, Nexus Studios, and Blumhouse bring immersive special effects to films like "M3GAN" and "The Black Phone" that aren't available anywhere else.

As part of Meta's partnership with James Cameron's Lightstorm Vision, an exclusive 3D clip of "Avatar: Fire and Ash" is available now in Meta Horizon TV for a limited time, offering fans a unique preview of Pandora ahead of the film's December theatrical release.

AI and Developer Ecosystem

Smart Glasses SDK

Meta announced a new developer toolkit for smart glasses, empowering third parties to build integrations and "skills" for Meta's AI wearables. This SDK, launching in preview for select partners, focuses on cloud-side integrations with Meta AI and opens opportunities for rapid innovation across both Ray-Ban Display and Oakley lines.

AI Glasses Making a Difference

Meta's AI glasses aren't just tech gadgets—they're becoming essential tools for accessibility and independence. Blind and low-vision users across America are using Ray-Ban Meta glasses to experience the world more independently, relying on Meta AI to describe surroundings, identify objects, or read food labels in grocery stores.

The impact has been so significant that VA Blind Rehabilitation Centers are now issuing Ray-Ban Meta glasses to support blind and low-vision veterans. The Blinded Veterans Association is developing comprehensive guides to help veterans use these glasses for daily living and navigate the world with greater autonomy and confidence.

The partnership with Be My Eyes, announced at last year's Connect, continues to expand globally. This service connects people who are blind or have low vision with sighted volunteers through the glasses, helping with tasks like grocery shopping, cooking meals, or picking out birthday cards—all hands-free. The feature is becoming available in more countries and languages, with an improved interface that lets users tap the side of their glasses rather than speaking a wake phrase out loud.

Meta Superintelligence Labs

Updates from Meta Superintelligence Labs revealed progress on multi-modal large language models and context-aware assistants. MSL is collaborating with Reality Labs on the next phase of wearable contextual AI, experimenting with proactive assistance and real-time language understanding across multiple modalities.

Business and Social Platform Enhancements

For professional users, new AI-powered collaboration tools for Horizon Workrooms and Messenger Spaces automate meeting notes, translation, and action-item summaries. Future enhancements to Facebook and Instagram will leverage generative AI for auto-highlighting stories, intelligent video segmentation, and personality-driven avatars for creators and brands.

The Bigger Picture

Meta Connect 2025 solidified Meta's vision for a future where wearable computing, AI assistance, and immersive experiences converge. The company is positioning itself not just as a device manufacturer, but as a platform provider for AI-driven XR development.

Notably absent from this year's Connect was any new VR headset hardware announcement. Instead, Meta emphasized expanding the Quest ecosystem through third-party manufacturers, with VR headsets from Asus and Lenovo running Quest OS highlighted during the event.

The announcements signal a clear shift toward ambient computing—technology that seamlessly integrates into our daily lives without requiring us to constantly engage with screens. With neural interfaces, display glasses, and AI assistants working in harmony, Meta is building the infrastructure for a truly hands-free digital future.

As these technologies mature and become more affordable, we're looking at the potential for a fundamental shift in how we interact with digital information—from pulling out phones to check messages, to having that information seamlessly integrated into our field of view, controlled by subtle gestures that feel as natural as pointing or waving.

The future of computing, as Meta envisions it, isn't about more powerful phones or larger screens—it's about making digital experiences so seamlessly integrated into our physical world that the boundary between them begins to disappear entirely.