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Investing.com -- Apple’s hardware ecosystem faces little threat from new AI-enabled smart glasses in the near term, according to Oppenheimer analysts, who argued that key design challenges remain unsolved.
After testing Meta’s new Ray-Ban Display glasses in a New York City demo, the brokerage said the experience highlighted “the key challenges that have prevented smart glasses from mass consumer adoption since Google Glass (2013).”
In particular, Oppenheimer said Meta’s single-eye display “fails to tackle well-known issues that cause eye strain and blurry vision.”
The analysts added that while the Ray-Ban Display introduces novel designs, it is “too early to view [it] as an everyday wearable such as Apple Watch, let alone a potential challenger to smartphones.”
Oppenheimer concluded: “We came away from the demo more confident that Apple’s hardware ecosystem is safe from new AI-enabled smart glasses for the next 2-3 years. It also gives Apple more runway to fine-tune its own smart glasses products.”
The report cited several barriers to adoption, including conflicts with human vision that “result in significant eye strain and blur after staring at the display for more than seconds.”
Oppenheimer said the Ray-Ban Display is best suited for brief glances, not “delivering denser information such as longer text or video.”
The firm also warned of “feature creep,” as Meta AI functions push the glasses to deliver more information than human vision comfortably allows.
While the demo showed early consumer interest, with stock selling out on launch day at the store visited, Oppenheimer’s verdict was clear: “We came away convinced that Ray-Ban Display will remain a niche product.”