Early-year Unpacked events are traditionally reserved for flagship phones. That said, it is hard to imagine Unpacked 2026 being entirely devoted to just three smartphones. Samsung will probably sprinkle in a few announcements for other highly anticipated devices.
OpenAI's first hardware release will be a smart speaker with a camera that will probably cost between $200 and $300, according to The Information. The device will be able to recognize things like "items on a nearby table or conversations people are having in the vicinity," The Information says, and it will have a Face ID-like facial recognition system so that people can purchase things. OpenAI acquired Jony Ive's hardware company last May in a deal worth nearly $6.5 billion.
Oakley Meta Vanguard was launched in India on Tuesday. Aimed at athletes who engage in outdoor activities, the smart glasses arrive as a redesigned version of the Ray-Ban Meta Glases. They feature a centrally-placed 12-megapixel camera with support for 1080p video recording at 60 frames per second (fps). Like the Ray-Ban Meta, the Oakley Meta Vanguard have Meta AI integration, enabling users to listen to or speak with Meta AI or on calls.
Oakley Meta HSTN smart glasses finally reached Indian shores late last year. Unlike the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, the Oakley Meta HSTN (referred to as how-stuhn) caters to a niche category of performance-focused users, such as athletes, sports enthusiasts, and techies who love to mix style and substance with the power of AI. Priced at Rs. 41,800, the Oakley Meta HSTN smart glasses aren't for everyone, but they bring the magic, turning your boring eyewear into AI-enabled gear.
The year 2026 marks a historic pivot in personal technology. We are moving past the era of the "AI chatbot" trapped inside a website and entering the age of ambient hardware. While 2025 was defined by software experimentation, 2026 is the year when specialized AI silicon, smart glasses, and wearable pins have matured into indispensable daily companions. These next-gen devices aren't just faster smartphones; they represent a fundamental shift in how we interact with the digital world.
First available in October of 2025, Solos is positioning the AirGo A5 as lightweight, comfortable smart glasses with hands-free AI assistance and a long-lasting battery. As a result, the target audience differs from that of the popular Meta Ray-Ban glasses, which are geared more towards content creation, as these are more intended for the AI enthusiast. Yet, they are still an investment, with the cheapest frames costing $249, so I put them to the test to determine if they are worth the price.
Smart glasses company Viture had a busy 2025, releasing its solid Luma series of glasses and ensuring that its pro mobile dock is compatible with Nintendo's Switch 2. Now it's kicking off 2026 by debuting a new model at CES, called The Beast, and it's available to preorder now for $549 with shipping starting in February. The price is high for a company known for
On a drizzly and windswept afternoon this summer, I visited the headquarters of Rokid, a startup developing smart glasses in Hangzhou, China. As I chatted with engineers, their words were swiftly translated from Mandarin to English, and then transcribed onto a tiny translucent screen just above my right eye using one of the company's new prototype devices. Rokid's high-tech spectacles use Qwen, an open-weight large language model developed by the Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba.
Looking at hardware, the color displays are clear and bright in all lighting conditions and I haven't had any issues seeing them. The glasses are powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon AR1 Gen 1 chipset, which is powerful, but unfortunately hasn't resulted in very good battery life. I've been getting about one to two hours of battery life, but it's also highly dependent on how active you are with the OS.
That's a great deal because, even though Meta released the Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 2) at the end of October, the last-gen glasses still offer great value. They're largely similar, offering much of the same experience - letting you play music, take photos, record 1080p video, and even livestream to Facebook or Instagram without pulling out your phone. And while the newer model shoots sharper 3K video at 30fps, both use the same 12-megapixel sensor so the image quality isn't noticeably different.
