Today, Meta unveiled the result of several years of research and development – its first AR glasses called Orion. Additionally, the company is launching a cheaper version of the Quest 3 VR glasses. There’s also a new pair of Ray-Ban glasses. It looks pretty awesome, but Orion is only a prototype and won’t be sold to consumers, so let’s start with the new Quest.
Meta Quest 3S
The Meta Quest 3S is a more affordable version of the Quest 3. In fact, it’s a mash-up of the Quest 2 and 3 to keep the price down. If you prefer the older, more capable model, you’ll be happy to know that prices are coming down (more on that in a bit).
The 3S starts at $300, but it uses the same Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset as the Quest 3, plus 8GB of RAM. And it has the same color passthrough that was a big upgrade from the Quest 2 (it uses a 4MP camera to bring the real world into view for AR experiences). So, what was cut to save costs?
Meta Quest 3S
Instead of dual LCDs, the 3S uses a single LCD with a slightly lower resolution per eye (1,832 x 1,920px vs 2,064 x 2,208px). The new LCD still offers fast 90Hz and 120Hz refresh rates, however, it lacks 72Hz and 80Hz options (these come in handy when using PCVR, for example, as lowering the refresh rate helps increase render resolution).
Perhaps more importantly, the Quest 3’s thin pancake lens has been replaced with the Quest 2’s older Fresnel lens. This makes the field of view 96° horizontal and 90° vertical, compared to 110° and 96°.
The 3S weighs almost the same (514 grams instead of 515 grams) but has slightly better battery life, at 2 hours 30 minutes (vs. 2 hours 12 minutes). This is despite having a smaller battery (4,324mAh vs. 5,060mAh).
The Meta Quest 3S has two memory capacities, 128GB and 256GB. You’ll find the prices below. Meanwhile, the 512GB Quest 3’s price has been reduced, so that’s also an option if you want a better display experience.
| Meta Quest 3S | 128GB | 256 GB |
|---|---|---|
| We | $300 | $400 |
| Canada | C$400 | C$550 |
| UK | £290 | £380 |
| European Union | €330 | €440 |
| Australia | 500 Australian Dollars | Australian Dollar 670 |
| Meta Quest 3 | 128GB | 512GB |
| We | $430 | $500 |
| Canada | C$580 | C$680 |
| UK | £410 | £470 |
| European Union | €480 | €550 |
| Australia | AU$800 | AU$1,050 |
Meta Orion
“Orion has the largest field of view in the smallest AR glasses to date” is the elevator pitch for these glasses. Note that while they look like Ray-Ban Stories, these are proper AR glasses with a pair of holographic displays and 3D mapping that can put virtual objects into the real world.
The Meta Orion glasses are suitable for indoor and outdoor use. The company says they are lightweight and have a “large” holographic display, but doesn’t give more details.
Holographic displays are transparent – you can see through them and people around you can see your eyes. The external display doesn’t require any trickery, which the Cupertino-based company had to resort to.
However, these displays are also capable of creating colorful graphics. This can be as simple as a virtual display hovering in the air or as complex as tapping into relevant Meta AI to recognize objects and tag them with additional information. In a demo, Meta showed food items on the counter, the glasses recognized them, tagged them and offered a possible recipe to make with them.
Meta says that to make Orion compact and stylish, its components had to be packed as tightly as possible, down to a fraction of a millimetre. And while these are the most advanced AR glasses ever, they still need polish. “Rather than rush to sell it, we decided to focus on internal development first, which means we can continue to build faster and push the boundaries of the technology, helping us reach an even better consumer product faster,” Meta writes.
Starting today, Meta employees and select external audiences will have access to the Orion prototype. This will help the team learn and improve so it can create a consumer product that will ship “in the near future.”
Before that happens, Meta wants to improve the quality of the displays, make the hardware even smaller and figure out how to mass-produce them so the finished products can be affordable for consumers.
Ray-Ban Meta
A new version of the Ray-Ban Meta glasses has also been introduced today. Unlike the Orion, these come with a head-mounted camera and AI assistant.
The Meta AI is now smarter and you only need to call it “Hey Meta” once, you don’t need to say it for every question. The glasses can also help you remember things – for example, they can remember where you parked your car. You can also use voice prompts to set reminders or send voice messages to WhatsApp and Messenger users.
New Ray-Ban Meta
Meta has partnered with Be My Eyes, a free app that connects sighted volunteers who want to help people who are blind or have low vision. The glasses will stream a POV video and the volunteer can help guide the user.
Meta has partnered with Audible and iHeart to give you even more things to listen to while using the glasses. Plus, it has improved existing integration with Spotify and Amazon Music.
If you want something more exclusive, Meta is launching shiny transparent Wayfarer frames. In addition, it has also introduced Luxottica’s new UltraTransition Gen S lenses, which adapt to different lighting conditions.
Ray-Ban Meta Shiny Transparent Edition • UltraTransition Lenses
Prices for the new Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarer glasses start at $300 and go up to $430 for a glossy transparent version with UltraTransition lenses.