You can order AI glasses with your prescription, but weight, battery life and bans on where they can be worn make them a risky only pair.
Yes, you can get AI glasses with your prescription lenses. Engadget's advice is to think twice before making them your only pair. They work as regular glasses, but they are heavier, need frequent charging, and are banned in a growing list of places.
Most AI glasses are regular-looking frames with extra tech built in. From a distance, a pair of Ray-Ban Meta looks like any other glasses. Because of that, the lenses can be swapped for prescription ones. Ray-Ban lets you order Meta's smart glasses with prescription lenses already installed. You upload your prescription, and the company handles the rest.
Regular glasses usually weigh 20 to 30 grams (0.7 to 1.1 ounces). AI glasses can weigh up to 80 grams (2.7 ounces). A few hours is fine, but the weight becomes noticeable over a full day.
Battery life is the other limit. AI glasses last an average of 3 to 5 hours. After that, they still work as regular glasses, but the AI features stop. Wearing them all day means charging again and again.
It is not illegal to wear AI glasses in public. But more places are saying no. Courts in England and Wales have banned Meta glasses from courtrooms, and New York followed in July. Many schools around the world do not allow students to wear them in class. Some workplaces ban them too.
The camera is usually the main worry. Audio can be a problem even if the camera is off. A real-time translation feature, for example, could end up uploading private conversations to a third-party server.
Meta has faced scrutiny over outsourced workers being able to see intimate images and videos captured by its AI glasses. The company says humans sometimes review content to improve the product. A German nonprofit has also filed a criminal complaint over the privacy of Meta's smart glasses.
The key risk is simple. If your glasses are the only way you can see well, a ban at work, school or court could leave you without them. Some wearers have also stopped using AI glasses in public because they fear being seen as stalkers or weirdos. For now, AI glasses make more sense as a second pair than as the one you rely on every day.
If you need glasses to see, keep a regular pair as your main one and treat AI glasses as a backup or extra.
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