Meta Launches $299 Smart Glasses, Undercutting Ray-Ban Line Ahead of Apple

Meta is moving fast. On Monday, the company released three new smart glasses under its own brand—the Adventurer, the Fury, and the Starfire—a deliberate pivot away from the Ray-Ban and Oakley partnerships that have defined its wearables strategy until now. The timing is pointed: Apple is expected to enter the smart glasses market in 2027, and Meta is working to cement its position before that happens.

The Adventurer and Fury models are priced at $299 each, which undercuts Meta's existing Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarer by eighty dollars. Both share a rectangular Wayfarer-like silhouette, though the Fury is thicker. The Starfire, the premium offering at $399, takes a different visual direction—a slimmer oval shape with a small gemstone set near the camera on the right lens. This model is the result of a collaboration with Kylie Jenner and includes her voice as an option for the AI assistant and onboarding prompts. The Starfire's case comes with a handwritten note from Jenner and a built-in mirror.

All three models carry the same core hardware as the existing Ray-Ban generation: a 12-megapixel camera, 3K video recording, five microphones, and an eight-hour battery. The included charging case extends that to roughly forty hours of additional power. Meta has also released a separate charging stand compatible with these new glasses and the older Ray-Ban and Oakley lines. What's new across the board is attention to fit—three-way adjustable nose pads, adjustable temple tips, and hinges that flare slightly for wider head shapes. The company is offering twenty-six color and lens combinations between the Adventurer and Fury alone, including tortoise, black, and green finishes, plus transition, polarized, and clear options. Prescription lenses are supported with a power range of minus twelve to plus two point twenty-five diopters.

EssilorLuxottica, the parent company of Ray-Ban and Oakley, is manufacturing these glasses despite Meta designing them in-house and putting its own name on them. The arrangement is visible on the temple arms and packaging, where both companies' logos appear. This manufacturing partnership suggests Meta is not yet ready to handle production entirely on its own, even as it moves toward brand independence in the category.

The software side reflects Meta's push into AI. The glasses ship with the Muse Spark AI model, which the company says improves response quality and expands live translation to twenty languages total, adding Mandarin, Korean, Japanese, Arabic, and Hindi to the existing lineup. A new feature called Dynamic Photo captures a burst of images and automatically selects the best shot. Pedestrian turn-by-turn navigation, which debuted on Meta's display glasses, is coming to the camera-equipped models.

Meta is also considering a camera-free version of its glasses, according to Bloomberg reporting. Such a model would focus on audio—phone calls, media playback, and AI interaction—and could lower the price point while enabling new design possibilities by eliminating the need for camera components and the regulatory scrutiny that comes with them.

The company did not shy away from naming Apple as a competitor. Alex Himel, speaking for Meta, called Apple "formidable" and acknowledged that the iPhone maker excels at hardware and design. He noted that Apple's glasses, when paired with the iPhone, may deliver a consumer experience that Meta cannot match in certain respects. Apple's smart glasses, expected in 2027, are designed in-house and will likely rely on a camera, microphones, and Siri for AI features without an integrated display—putting them in direct competition with Meta's camera-equipped lineup rather than the higher-end display models Meta also makes.

Meta explored facial recognition tools for identifying people the wearer knows but has not moved the feature into active development while it works through privacy and societal concerns. The Adventurer, Fury, and Starfire are available starting today through Meta and EssilorLuxottica retail partners including LensCrafters.