Quite some time ago, Meta sent me over a pair of Ray-Ban Headliner sunglasses. My understanding is that this particular model could possible be discontinued, or at least very hard to get, but I wanted to give a broader review of smart glasses in general as of 2025. Why? Because frankly, they are surging in popularity. Just the other night I watched some of WWE’s Summerslam and saw Jake Paul flying through the air recording with a pair. Given his considerable wealth, the question I want to answer for you is this: are Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses worth it in 2025?

Design & Build Quality

Ray-Ban is probably one of the best known sunglasses brands in the world. So first and foremost, I expected a great pair of sunnies. Sure enough, the Headliners are. The design is probably a personal preference because the frames, in order to house the technology, are a little chunkier than most glasses. Despite this, they remain nice and light.

Now, it’s probably over 12-months since I got these, and I use them regularly. Mainly just as sunglasses. But the odd time I’ll have them on for filming, and at times they get passed around because they interest people.

I can’t tell you when, but they did get cracked at some stage. The crack isn’t massive, but I can tell you that it wouldn’t have happened because of extremely rough handling. One massive positive is that despite that crack, which isn’t all that visible, the glasses still function perfectly, look more or less perfect and even survived me changing the lenses.

Which does bring me onto an important point. The lenses.

My lenses scratched nearly immediately. Right in the middle of my line of sight. It irritated the hell out of me. I also found having such a useful point of view (POV – more on this later) camera limited to a bright environment irritating too. So I went onto Amazon and found myself some after market reactive lenses.

I don’t fully understand why this isn’t just the standard default choice for smart glasses because it totally changed them. The new lenses were stronger, not quite as dark in the sun, but also fantastic for filming clips indoors when needed. I spotted a few months after getting these that you could at least opt for reactive lenses, but again – for the price these things cost, it should be the standard.

The good news is that the reactive lenses I got are grand, not expensive and rather easy to swap in even with a cracked frame.

Technology Performance

While the sunglasses were always going to be a decent pair of sunglasses, the smart side of things that Meta brought to the table was a much more mixed bag.

Camera

It’s a positive start for the camera on the Meta Ray-Ban Headliners. The camera is absolutely stunning. From the quality, to the form factor of having a camera that leaves both hands free, I loved every second of creating videos with these glasses.

One flaw was when wearing a peaked hat, the shooting could often fail. Which seems utterly stupid to me. I’d rather have a shot where my hat is in the way than losing the footage of a moment completely. There were also shots where, I think because of direct sunlight, the glasses would again ditch footage because it didn’t deem the capture of high enough quality. Sorry, but I’d rather be the one making the call on that.

Regardless of these flaws, the glasses just bring so much to the table. Having that POV shot is so valuable for unboxing stuff or similar ideas. You can see some of that type of footage in this video.

I also found being able to take pictures or videos without pulling out my phone fantastic. I’ve been to gigs where I could capture the moment while still looking at it and, more important, not having my phone out blocking everyone else.

Calls, Music and Movies

I’ve taken countless calls on my Meta Ray-Ban sunglasses and had no issue whatsoever. They use open-ear technology, not bone-conduction. So in loud environments, it can be difficult to make out the call. Others have never had an issue hearing me either.

The issue is much more practical. These look like a normal pair of glasses. That simply means when you take a call, people first assume you have earbuds in. When they see you don’t, they think you’re a can short of a six-pack.

I’ve also been using the Headliners for listening to music and even watching movies or TV. Fantastic for when herself is in the changing rooms and I find myself a nice wee seat for a few minutes.

AI Technology

Unfortunately, the “very good” stops at the camera and audio. Once we’re into the AI features, I’ve found them lacking in experience.

The idea is that you can, for example, sit in a German restaurant without a lick of German and have your glasses take a picture of a menu and translate everything for you. The AI is slow, far to talkative and half the time it simply doesn’t achieve the task. I found myself still reaching for my phone in these kinds of scenarios because the AI-element simply wasn’t reliable.

Even connecting services like Spotify requires AI to be enabled. But when I followed the instructions to call up music via my glasses, it failed. The result was me again just typically going to my phone instead of interfacing through an unreliable glasses interface.

Early days, the battery life suffered terrible from AI-usage. So I arrived at the conclusion that no matter how much Mark Zuckerberg want’s me to use his AI technology, I wasn’t bothered with it. The AI switch is set to off, and it’s staying there (except for the odd test to see if it’s any use yet).

Battery life is a really important point too.

Battery Life

The battery life on these glasses is horrendous. I’ve had scenarios where I’ve shot maybe 4 or 5 3-minute videos only to find the glasses dying. The situation is made every-so-slightly better by the fact that the case does charge the glasses.

The advertising for the glasses claim up to 36 hours battery life with the case and 4 hours on a single charge without. I’ve no idea what kind of lab conditions brought those numbers, but they’re wildly at odds with my experience. Of course, video capture is going to burn through battery, but surely that is one of the primary reasons you buy a product like this.

I’m not going to say it ruins them. Because not every shot needs to be a POV shot. However, it is a massive caveat when buying a fairly expensive product.

Which leads me onto the killer question.

Are Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses Worth It?

At the time of writing, the cheapest pair of Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses cost €329. The lenses I bought for mine were an absolute game-changer, so I’d recommend factoring in the extra €40 they cost too, particularly if you want POV smart glasses that can shoot indoors and be sunglasses outdoors. I have to say, throwing them on the groom at a friend’s wedding as he ran around the dance floor is a cool shot to get.

This leaves me with one of the hardest review conclusions I’ve ever had. Because the price of these things is, frankly, ridiculous. I can’t justify the price.

But, if you are a content creator, or just like getting a unique shot on your holidays, I could just as easily make a case for these being a great purchase. This shot could have never been captured without my smart glasses.

Are they perfect? Absolutely not. Some of the headline features (pardon the pun) are outright useless. But the core creator uses for glasses like these can be invaluable in your toolkit. I think I’ll file these away under “considered purchase” or “really nice to get as a gift”.

The average score for this particular product might seem low, but it’s really down to how much you want and use these, also suffering because the AI-features and battery are quite poor. That said, I love them.