Meta has recently unveiled its Aria Gen 2 platform, a major leap forward from the company’s previous innovations, including the highly anticipated Orion smart glasses, which feature advanced holographic display technology. Though the Orion glasses won’t hit the market for a few more years, the Aria Gen 2 is now making waves.
The Aria Gen 2 resembles the familiar Ray-Ban Meta Stories smart glasses but boasts bulkier arms and several significant improvements. Notably, these smart glasses include a photoplethysmogram (PPG) sensor integrated into the nose pad, allowing for heart rate monitoring. This feature distinguishes them as the first smart glasses to offer such biosensing capabilities, although competitors like Apple’s Beats PowerBeats Pro 2 earbuds also incorporate heart rate sensors.
Think of them as Ray-Ban Stories with too many onboard sensors.
In addition to the PPG sensor, Meta has upgraded the Aria Gen 2’s sensor suite, arming the glasses with a standard RGB camera and eye-tracking technology. They also include Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) cameras that support six degrees of freedom (DoF) movement, enhancing their ability to perceive and navigate their surroundings.
The device is equipped with a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), a barometer to measure atmospheric pressure, and a magnetometer. There’s also an innovative microphone array that uses contact-based technology to focus on the speaker’s voice while filtering out surrounding noise.
To power this extensive array of sensors, Meta has developed a custom processing system designed for efficiency. The Aria Gen 2 smart glasses have an impressive battery life, allowing for six to eight hours of continuous use.
Unfortunately, these smart glasses will not be available to the general public. Instead, they are being distributed to researchers and Meta employees, specifically within the Reality Labs and FAIR AI divisions. The glasses are expected to be useful across various sectors, including automotive applications and the development of medical technologies aimed at assisting individuals with visual impairments and navigation challenges.
Moreover, the data collected from the Aria Gen 2 smart glasses will play a crucial role in advancing robotics research. Meta has been investing in robotic technologies for several years and is reportedly looking into projects involving humanoid robots in the near future.
