Meta is launching its new Ray-Ban Meta Audio smart glasses at an interesting time. The company is fighting a reputation that it makes "pervert glasses" with the standard Ray-Ban Meta glasses that feature cameras.

Plenty of other companies, like Even Realities, whose CEO decried cameras on glasses over the summer. "Adding a camera onto a pair of glasses definitely introduces many more downsides than upsides."

With those concerns in mind, I tried out the audio-only Meta glasses during Meta Connect 2026. Will Meta's new camera-free specs open up a new segment for the company?

On the surface, these glasses are just Ray-Ban Metas. The lack of a camera means that they're lighter and enables Meta and Ray-Ban to introduce new styles like the Clubmaster, which features more of a wire frame around the lenses.

The glasses weigh just 43 grams, which is roughly 10 ounces lighter than the Ray-Ban Meta gen 2 specs..

They do have more battery life than the camera-version, hitting a claimed 12 hours over the recently updated 9 hours in the Gen 3 version of the Ray-Ban Meta glasses.

Per Meta, the glasses come in 23 color and lens combinations between the Clubmaster and Burbank styles.

The glasses launch on October 13 for $349. The price is perhaps the most surprising thing about the Audio glasses. Removing the camera apparently does not make them cheaper.

Yes, the Ray-Ban Meta (Gen 3) glasses start at $449, but the currently available Gen 2 glasses start at $379, only $30 more expensive.

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