Apple launches new internal study focused on building smart glasses

After announcing Vision Pro last year, Apple has reportedly been exploring more ways to provide AR and VR content to users – and it seems that the idea of smart glasses is growing within the company. A Bloomberg report on Monday revealed that Apple has been conducting a new internal study focusing on building smart glasses.

Apple wants to know what its employees think about smart glasses

According to the report, the initiative is known internally as “Atlas” and would have started last week with Apple employees giving feedback and thoughts on smart glasses. The group responsible for the initiative wrote an email to selected employees confirming the studies on products in this segment.

“Testing and developing products that all can come to love is very important to what we do at Apple. This is why we are looking for participants to join us in an upcoming user study with current market smart glasses,” the email reads.

As detailed by Bloomberg, Apple often gathers secret groups when it has plans to launch a new category of product. The company prefers to collect feedback from employees rather than customers in order to keep its plans secret. The study suggests that Apple wants to push ahead with the idea of building its own smart glasses.

This isn’t the first time rumors have suggested that Apple has considered creating smart glasses. However, the idea seems to be becoming more mature within the company. While the Vision Pro costs $3,499 and isn’t a huge success, Meta has been doing well with its smart glasses built in partnership with Ray-Ban.

Ray-Ban Meta glasses are not as advanced as Apple Vision Pro, as they don’t even have a display. But users can still listen to songs, answer calls, talk to an AI assistant and capture photos and videos with the glasses. Because Vision Pro is so expensive and heavy, Apple seems to want to build cheaper and lighter glasses for the masses.

A few months ago, Meta unveiled its latest project called “Orion,” which is a pair of glasses that have Micro LED projectors inside the frames to show images in front of the eyes. Meta said it is not yet close to launching Orion, but journalists who were able to try out the device said they were impressed by its technology. After all, smart glasses are much lighter than a full headset.

Unfortunately, the report says that it will be years before Apple has its smart glasses ready to show the world. Until then, the company has been working on a cheaper version of the Apple Vision Pro, as well as a second generation with a faster chip.

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