The next era of smart glasses could be a lot more affordable than we originally thought, with Meta planning to slash hundreds of pounds off the cost of its next pair.
According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman the pair, rumoured to be called the Meta Celeste, will start at $800 rather than well over $1000, as earlier reports suggested.
As well as Meta having found a way to simply make the pair more cheaply, it’s expected to be making less of a profit in order to get this headgear on the bonces of more people.
However, your first reaction to this may well be — why should we pay potentially £800 or more when you can pick up a pair of Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers for £299?
The Meta Celeste are in a whole different class of wearable. They provide the wearer with an HUD, a head-up display, and connect to a smart ring used for gesture controls.
Never tried a pair of Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers? They can take photos and play audio through open-ear speakers built into the glasses, but there’s no screen hidden in or around the lenses.
They may be less techy than the more-than-a-decade-old Google Glass, but have proved a bit of a hit. Over two million of the Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarers have been sold, as Ray-Ban owner EssilorLuxottica confirmed in February 2025.
With a set like the Meta Celeste, you’ll be able to see, rather than just hear, feedback from the glasses. And that could be a big deal in the era of AI chatbots.
Possible functions for that screen include real-time translation of conversations, navigation instructions and text answers from the Meta AI assistant.
Loads more important questions still need to be answered, though. We don’t know how wide the field of view will be — how much of your vision the presumably translucent display will inhabit. And we don’t know its resolution either.
It will be a test of whether a little extra bulk will put off the people who were drawn in by how much like ordinary sunglasses the Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarer appear.
Early reports suggest the Celeste will weigh around 70g, where the current Meta smart glasses weigh 48-51g depending on the exact version you choose.
If Meta is going to release the Celeste glasses this year, we’ll no doubt hear a lot more about them during Meta Connect, a two-day conference on September 17th and 18th.
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