Augmented reality (AR) glasses and smart glasses have been available for more than a decade, but adoption by the market is moving slowly. Within the past year, smart glasses gained momentum largely driven by the widespread integration of artificial intelligence (AI). The competitive landscape is no longer just about the hardware but is increasingly about the platforms and ecosystems being built by big tech players such as Google, Meta, and Apple, which are forming strategic partnerships to draw more users into their respective platforms.
AI is providing content and new use cases that were sorely missing from the head-wearable AR market. Smart glasses enable seamless all-day access to AI, which can provide guidance throughout the day and promise “superhuman” capabilities.
The rapid adoption of smart glasses is most notable with the launch of Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarer glasses. Reportedly, two million units of the smart glasses were sold during 2024, and sales are projected to grow substantially in 2025—with a target of 10 million units per year by 2026.
Meta’s recent introduction of Meta Ray-Ban Display, AI glasses with a full-color display, fueled excitement for this technology. Meta’s competitors are also developing AI glasses. Apple’s first AI glasses are expected to debut in 2026, while Xiaomi unveiled its first AI glasses during June 2025. Google, which arguably started the latest phase of AR with Google Glass, is back in the game and is partnering with Magic Leap and Samsung on hardware.
Key players are strategically positioning themselves to capture a significant share of the glasses market. In some cases, this involves partnerships with fashion brands like Meta’s successful collaboration with Essilor Luxottica. Similarly, Google is working with Gentle Monster and Warby Parker to develop smart glasses powered by Android XR.
The world of fashion sunglasses and AR glasses are converging, and sunglasses and prescription glasses of the future will likely feature an embedded AR function, much like most new cars today are equipped with a navigation system and smart features.
Changes in ambient light
An augmented image greatly extends the capabilities of smart glasses. Some early instances of AR display use cases include envisioning what a 3D object looks like within a space, driving directions overlaid with the real world, labeling objects or people within a scene, showing how to make a repair by overlaying instructions on the item to be repaired, or being able to see another person’s expressions during a video call.
Some tech leaders believe AR glasses with displays could replace our smartphones one day. But the widespread adoption of AR glasses depends on many technologies coming together into one form factor: They must shrink both in size and price, have good battery life, and feature optics and displays that create true-to-life images. AR glasses must be useful beyond the “wow” factor of a demo room and be real-world usable.
Dimming is a must-have feature
One of the challenges making AR glasses for the user environment is that people move around throughout the day and encounter changes within lighting conditions and real-world backgrounds that interact with augmented images.
Dimming is an important consideration for all-day wearable devices because it dramatically improves the augmented image quality. The intensity of ambient light varies greatly indoors vs. outdoors. Outdoor light can be as bright as 100,000 nits, while indoor environments are typically much dimmer—falling within the 100- to 500-nit range. It’s important to note that waveguides, birdbath optical, and other combiners can’t project black. A dimmer in dark mode provides a black projection screen for images and occludes the real world. This occlusion increases contrast of the image and preserves color, while improving battery life in the process.
Three types of dimming exist: Global, segmented, and pixelated (see Fig. 1 and table). Global dimming adjusts the brightness of the entire lens, which is often automatically based on ambient light or content. Segmented dimming independently controls fixed portions of the lens and can be used to enhance the contrast of specific information like text messages while maintaining visibility of the real world. And pixelated dimming offers the most immersive experience by selectively dimming individual pixels behind an augmented image, which makes virtual objects appear solid against the real-world background (see Fig. 2).