Snap's CEO Told Me About Its New AR Glasses, Coming in 2026
Last year I played around with the latest AR glasses from Snap, the company behind the popular social media app Snapchat. The glasses allowed me to play multiplayer games overlaid in the real world, they worked outdoors and used AI. The ones I tested were meant for developers, not everyday people.
Snap's AR Spectacles are going on sale for real in 2026. I spoke to Snap's CEO Evan Spiegel about what to expect. He promised a smaller design, better battery life and more AI features. They'll work without needing a phone, but they'll be arriving in a more crowded glasses landscape than ever.
A lot of tech companies are working on getting smart glasses on your face. These devices promise to integrate with the real world to augment reality with information, games and more. Meta's doing it, Google's doing it, Apple might be doing it and Snap's been doing it for years, releasing its Snap Spectacles back in 2020. The 2026 version of Snap's glasses could be arriving ahead of its competitors in the AR glasses race. The aim is to bring games and 3D collaborative experiences to a larger audience, but at an unknown price and design. Here's what we know so far.
Smaller Snap AR Spectacles, better battery life
I tried Snap's AR Spectacles several times since last year. They float 3D graphics into the real world with transparent lenses using waveguides and internal projectors. They include built-in hand tracking via cameras, feeling almost like a hybrid between VR devices like the Quest 3 and future AR glasses like Meta's Orion. But their battery life was extremely short: only around 45 minutes. And they look a lot bigger and thicker than any everyday pair of glasses, or even other smart glasses like Meta Ray-Bans.
Spiegel says that AR apps (that Snap calls Lenses) made for developer Spectacles will work on the upcoming glasses, but that it'll be "a ton more capable at a fraction of the weight, and in a smaller form."
I mentioned my concern about the battery life. "Battery life will be dramatically improved," Spiegel replied. "And, you know, again, it'll depend on the task. If you're doing something really heavy-duty and immersive in AR versus more passive browsing or streaming, you'll see differences in battery life."
It also sounds like these upcoming glasses will have better displays, or at least more compact ones. "There'll be some pretty meaningful improvements to the wave guide in the optical engine in this next generation," Spiegel said. "That's part of what enables the form factor and the capability improvement."
Standalone but not quite 'everyday' glasses
Much like Snap's existing AR Spectacles, released last year, these new glasses are also designed to work on their own. "They'll be fully standalone," said Spiegel, "But if you want to use it with your phone, with the phone as a controller or something like that, we offer a lot of those sorts of services to developers."
Snap's glasses currently use phones as either handheld remotes or motion controllers if apps want to build in support. They use hand tracking and a pinch-and-gesture system to control the OS otherwise.
Don't expect these to truly replace your everyday glasses. No one's made full augmented reality glasses that can last a full day yet, and Snap doesn't sound like they've done it either. "I wouldn't say that they're necessarily designed for all day wear, although someone could use them that way if they wanted," said Spiegel. "Where we focus more is on the capability side to enable true computing experiences. I wouldn't think of it as a smartphone peripheral. I would think about this as a full featured computer."
A depth-sensing tool will allow AI to recognize 3D environments.
Snap
AI, including Gemini, that can see your 3D world
One of the new AR tools Snap's announced is a way to share the scanned depth map of your area on glasses with onboard AI services. Spiegel calls it "spatial intelligence," and it's not something I've seen discussed by any other glasses- or headset-makers yet. It could allow large language model AI to get an understanding of your own space, and possibly combine it with other data. Spiegel said these tools could start "labeling objects around you or helping instruct you how to do something, not through a text or voice based interface, but actually in the world with you."
Snap's also brought support for Google's Gemini AI on its Spectacles, which can already connect with ChatGPT. Supporting different AI services is part of Spiegel's pitch to make Snap's AR glasses also work as an AI platform. Snap's Spectacles aren't part of Google's Android XR ecosystem yet, but Spiegel is open to it: "We would love to make sure Spectacles interoperate as tightly as possible with other platforms and services. That's part of delivering a great customer experience, and certainly something we're thinking about."
Camera-enabled AI also brings its own privacy questions. A new tool called SmartGate aims to wall off camera data and keep it from leaking outside the glasses, an increasingly important feature as more AI apps will start being able to access home depth maps and camera data. How will Snap strike that balance? It remains to be seen. "Trying to continue to architect our system in a way that developers and users can get the full power of AI without compromising on privacy is something that's really important to us," said Spiegel. It's a territory every AI-enabled glasses maker is going to have to navigate.
A number of augmented-reality game apps already live on Snap's Spectacles, and we can expect more with multiplayer features. Seen here: Pool Assist by Studio ANRK.
Snap
Multiplayer games are a big part of Snap's pitch
I played a lot of short game experiences on Spectacles the last time I tried them, and Snap's glasses can share AR collaboratively with other people in real-world spaces. Think collaborative Lego brick-building, or outdoor virtual laser tag.
Games sound like a big part of Snap's approach to its next glasses, too, especially multiplayer. "[Gaming is] one of the things that's most exciting to me, because it really brings people together in a shared space," Spiegel said. "I remember when I was a kid playing N64 and having kids over your house and playing together, but I think this takes sort of that concept of shared play to a whole new level, because you can run around outside and share these experiences."
That collaborative AR play is a unique feature to Spectacles at the moment, and it could spark some fun game ideas, and pave some of the way towards outdoor AR collaborative apps to come.
Expect real-world installations and demos
Spiegel didn't give a specific answer when I asked how these Spectacles will be sold, but it sounds like the goal is to build out experiential demo opportunities. While Meta Ray-Bans and Google's upcoming AI glasses will be sold in optical shops, Snap used to sell its Spectacles out of whimsical pop-up vending machines.
"We've had so much fun thinking about different ways to distribute Specs," said Spiegel. "In the case of this product, it's just not something you can really believe until you try it. And so a lot of our efforts are just going to be focused on helping people all over the world try and experience [them]."
Installations at museums, art exhibits, pop-up events or maybe even theme parks could be part of it. "We've seen a lot of demand for location-based experiences, and that's why we're releasing some new tools specifically for folks who are trying to design experiences around museums or monuments, or these sort of shared game experiences," said Spiegel.
Maybe Snap's AR glasses will emerge in some real-world experience you get to try before you even think about buying. And maybe that's the best way for any of these future AR glasses to really prove what they can do.
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