Google has given us the skinny on exactly how its Android XR smart glasses will work in the future.
Google/s I/O 2025 conference just took place, and we got to hear about the tech giant’s plans for how AI is going to be put in front of our eyeballs in the future, with Android XR.
Android XR was announced ages ago, in December 2024, and we now know a bit more about how it’ll work. Later this year we’ll get Samsung’s VR-style headset, codenamed Project Moohan, but the subject during I/O 2025 was more focused on smart glasses.
Google says we’ll use these glasses for “messaging friends, making appointments, asking for turn-by-turn directions, taking photos and more,” with Gemini AI acting as the bridge between us and the glasses themselves.
The demo showed how Android XR smart glasses will operate when there’s a display in tow. We saw a conversation being live translated between Spanish and English, someone sending a message using voice transcription and a preview of how turn-by-turn navigation instructions will appear on a pair of Android XR smart glasses.
It’s a set of familiar ideas, but with an execution that stops you needing to constantly get your phone out of your pocket. With any luck.
As part of the announcement we also heard a few of the early partnership Google has with folks who will actually make the smart glasses.
Who will make Android XR smart glasses?
Google has teamed up with Warby Parker, one of the top glasses retailers in the US, and Gentle Monster. And it has announced Samsung will make smart glasses as well as more VR-style headsets — we’ve already heard plenty of rumours about these, though.
Xreal adds more chum to the gumbo, having teased its own Aura specs. These look like sunglasses, and use “optical see-through” tech, which in previous Xreal glasses lets you either block out the outside world or have a translucent view of your surroudings.
It’s described as a “tethered” pair, though, meaning you might use them to see stuff during a transatlantic flight, plugged into a laptop perhaps, rather than while walking around the streets.
Wondering about the “when, where, and how much” of it all? Us too.
What we know so far is Samsung’s Project Moohan headset is due this year, and that developers will get access to Android XR in 2025 too, in order to let them start making apps.
The wording on all this suggests we should expect these smart glasses in 2026 or beyond.
