Halliday promises its smart wayfarers have a ‘proactive’ AI assistant inside
Smart glasses tend to be devices that overpromise and underdeliver, especially when being shown off for the first time at an event like CES. There’s always a steady stream of companies promising we’re on the cusp of having our very own Gary-from-Veep attached to our faces before fading away into obscurity. The weight of promises Halliday has laid upon the table is a sign of braggadocio, but it’ll take a while before we know if it’s deserved or not.
For CES 2025, Halliday has turned up with a pair of eponymous smart glasses seemingly filled to the brim with technology. The right eyecup has a waveguide display that will project the equivalent of a 3.5-inch screen into the wearer’s view, while keeping that viewport easy to read in strong lighting. The company also promises that this hardware is “invisible to onlookers.” The glasses themselves weigh just 35 grams and should get up to eight hours of battery life on a single charge.
Halliday
There’s no outward-facing camera, but Halliday says its product comes with a “proactive” AI assistant, anticipating your needs before you ask. The glasses have built-in microphones that are listening to your conversations, analyzing them and answering prompts as they come up. If you were to wear one of these in a meeting, say, you’d be able to ask the system to produce a summary of said meeting immediately afterward. (And yes, we are curious about the privacy implications of such a system.)
As well as barking instructions to your glasses, the sides are touch sensitive, but it’s more likely your main mode of interaction will be with the bundled trackpad ring. You should be able to discreetly control what the AI is pumping to your eyes without attracting attention.
Halliday
There’s a fairly long list of tasks Halliday says the glasses will be able to grease the wheels for you. As well as listening out for questions in conversation and throwing up answers from the internet, you can use the screen as a hidden teleprompter. It can also translate 40 different languages, offer real-time directions and play music with the accompanying on-screen lyrics.
Of course, none of this is anything but sweet words until we’ve been able to see how this performs in the real world. Halliday says that pre-orders for the glasses will begin at the end of CES, with shipping starting at some point before March 2025. We don’t know the price yet, but the company says it’ll be between $399 and $499.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/halliday-promises-its-smart-wayfarers-have-a-proactive-ai-assistant-inside-010007688.html?src=rss