Meta Ray-Ban Display Glasses Review: Great Potential, Needs More Polish
I’ve been using the Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses for some time now, and overall, my experience has been positive. The display is sharp, clear, and easy to read, and the neural band is highly responsive and intuitive. It didn’t take long to get comfortable with the controls.
I mainly use the glasses to record short clips of my surroundings and to capture spontaneous thoughts using the built-in camera. I also listen to music and occasionally ask the AI basic questions. In these everyday scenarios, the glasses already feel useful and futuristic.
That said, while the hardware shows a lot of promise, the product still feels unfinished in several areas. Most of the issues I’ve encountered seem like minor software or usability refinements that would likely be easy to fix, but addressing them would greatly improve the overall experience.
What Works Well
- Sharp, easy-to-read display
- Responsive and intuitive neural band
- Convenient for quick video recording and voice notes
- Comfortable for listening to music and casual AI interactions
Areas for Improvement
- When the glasses are charging in the case, they sometimes remain connected to the phone via Bluetooth, preventing the phone’s speakers from working.
- The auto-adjusting volume feature, while a good idea in theory, performs poorly in real-world use. While walking on the street, passing cars make the music louder. This behavior might make sense for podcasts or audiobooks, but it is undesirable for music.
- Bug: Video recordings are capped at one minute, even though a three-minute limit is set.
- Possible bug: Activating the neural band is inconsistent. Despite the instructions stating that holding the button until it pulses white is sufficient, a second press is often required to confirm activation with a green light.
- The wide-angle HD camera requires frequent digital zoom, which noticeably degrades image quality.
- There is a noticeable delay when taking photos.
- The software feels sluggish overall—features like the camera, live translation, and live captions take too long to start.
- WhatsApp video calls consume excessive Wi-Fi bandwidth.
- Bug: Occasionally, after powering the glasses off and back on, they get stuck with a pulsing white LED.
- Recorded videos sometimes start with about one second of silence, and frame rate inconsistencies occur.
Final Thoughts
The Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses are a solid product with strong fundamentals, especially in terms of display quality and input responsiveness. However, the experience is held back by software bugs, performance issues, and a lack of polish. With a few targeted fixes and optimizations, these glasses could move from “promising” to genuinely great.