Later this year, Snap will launch its latest consumer version of AR glasses, called Specs. In anticipation of that big event, the company launched a new subsidiary, Specs Inc., which will focus solely on further developing the glasses.
Snap announced the new company on Tuesday, saying the move will allow for “greater focus and coordination” as it continues to develop its products. This shows that Snap, like other tech giants (see: Meta and Apple), is serious about smart glasses, but it’s worth noting that the company has been developing AR hardware for quite some time.
In fact, Snap started working on the technology behind Specs more than a decade ago, but the company last offered consumer glasses in 2019. Since 2024, the latest version of the hardware (technically the 5th generation) has been a developer-only product, allowing Snap to work on implementing the kinds of programs on the wearable that it hopes will be a hit upon launch.
As Snap continues to improve its product, other companies are leading the way in the AR glasses race, most notably Meta. Meta has ended deals with major eyewear companies (Ray-Ban and Oakley through partnerships with brand owner EssilorLuxottica) while enjoying increased demand in the U.S., but Snap clearly hopes to make meaningful inroads into that market once the glasses launch later this year.
At CES earlier this month, I met up with Specs Product Manager Russell Patton, who gave me a chance to demo Snap’s new headgear. Patton, who gave us a tour of the device’s user experience and latest features, said the “spatial nature” of the specs means there’s a lot of user experiences to enjoy that aren’t possible on a mobile phone. That spatial experience is primarily enabled by the glasses’ four cameras, which enable hand tracking and the company’s Snap Spatial Engine, a software component that projects AR images of the device.
The spec runs on Snap OS, a separate operating system whose latest version was released last September. It’s worth noting that the latest version includes an improved browser (which I was able to try by visiting the TechCrunch website) and an AI-powered feature (called “Spatial Hints”) that can provide you with automatically generated information about what you happen to be looking at (I was staring at a table full of snacks, and my glass gave me a hint as to which one was healthiest). It also includes a “travel mode” that helps travelers translate foreign road signs and menus, Snap says.
Then there are games. During the demo, I managed to walk through Avatar: The Last Airbender and it was a lot of fun. The headsets also have the ability to sync with each other. This means that two different people wearing different glasses can see the same thing in the same physical space. As you can imagine, this opens the door to collaborative games.
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The shape of the glasses I used was a little unwieldy (a little heavy at about 8 ounces) and they tended to get hot after use, but the team told me that the particular glasses I was using lasted all day. The physical configuration of the hardware is also expected to change before it is released to the public.
The company has not yet revealed an official release date, so interested consumers will need to keep an eye on that announcement.
Correction: 3rd generation consumer glasses were released in 2019, not 2018 as mentioned above. This article has been updated since publication to reflect the correct year.
