Rumors are swirling that Apple is cooking up two variations of its Vision Pro headset. But that’s not all—according to a fresh report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the tech behemoth from Cupertino is setting its sights on outpacing Meta with a new pair of AR glasses.
Drawing insights from a well-placed source, the report suggests that Apple CEO Tim Cook is laser-focused on the development of AR glasses, making it his main mission to launch them before Meta can introduce their version.
“Tim’s not really focused on anything else right now,” the insider told Bloomberg. “From a product development perspective, this is his prime concern.”
However, crafting AR glasses designed for all-day use is a complex, long-term endeavor. Apple faces numerous technical challenges: integrating high-resolution displays, developing a powerful yet compact chip, and ensuring a battery can last throughout the day—all at a cost consumers can afford.
On the flip side, while Apple hesitates to publicly discuss its next move, Meta has been more transparent about its plans in the XR landscape. Late in 2024, Meta unveiled its Orion AR glasses. They’re hoping this will set the stage for a consumer-oriented product by the end of the decade, albeit with a price tag somewhere between a phone and a laptop. Currently, these Orion glasses cost Meta around $10,000 each, primarily due to their custom silicon carbide waveguide optics.
Although the immediate product release of Orion isn’t feasible, Meta is forging ahead in the XR space. They’ve made significant strides with multiple Quest standalone headset iterations and, in collaboration with EssilorLuxottica, the Ray-Ban Meta Glasses. These glasses have been a hit, paving the way for Meta’s envisioned AR future.
The success of these smart glasses has spurred Meta to work on a subsequent generation featuring a monoscopic heads-up display. While they’re not full-fledged AR glasses, they serve as a stepping stone towards that technology. More distinctions between smart glasses and AR models are explored here.
Meanwhile, Gurman hints that Apple is developing refreshed versions of the Apple Watch and AirPods, equipped with AI-enabled cameras. Yet, Apple is reportedly still mulling over whether to challenge Meta’s offerings with its own smart glasses.
As per Gurman, the device under development by Apple is intended to integrate seamlessly with Siri and Apple Visual Intelligence, but the company remains cautious about media capture capabilities due to its commitment to user privacy.
This news comes in the wake of a broader executive shake-up within Apple. Last month, Bloomberg reported that Apple’s Vision Products Group (VPG) saw its team spread across the firm, a move diverging from the “functional” management model Steve Jobs established in the early ’90s. This restructuring aligns Vision Pro’s development more closely with Apple’s other key hardware efforts like the iPhone and iPad.
