Google XR glasses hands-on: Lightweight but with a limited field of view
One of the biggest reveals of Google I/O was that the company is officially back in the mixed reality game with its own prototype XR smart glasses . It's been years since we've seen anything substantial from the search giant on the AR/VR/XR front, but with a swath of hardware partners to go with its XR platform it seems that's finally changing.
Following the keynote, Google showed off a very short demo of the prototype device we saw onstage. I only got a few minutes with the device so my impressions are unfortunately very limited, but I was immediately impressed with how light the glasses were compared with Meta's Orion prototype and Snap's augmented reality Spectacles. While both of those are quite chunky, Google's prototype device was lightweight and felt much more like a normal pair of glasses. The frames were a bit thicker than what I typically wear, but not by a whole lot. Karissa Bell for Engadget
At the same time, there are some notable differences between Google's XR glasses and what we've seen from Meta and Snap. Google's device only has a display on one side — the right lens, you can see it in the image at the top of this article — so the visuals are more "glanceable" than fully immersive. I noted during Google's demo onstage at I/O that the field of view looked narrow and I can confirm that it feels much more limited than even Snap's 46-degree field of view (Google declined to share specifics on how wide the field of view is on its prototype.)
Instead, the display felt a bit similar to how you might use the front display of a foldable phone. You can get a quick look at the time and notifications and small snippets of info from your apps, like what music you're listening to.
Obviously, Gemini is meant to play a major role in the Android XR ecosystem and Google walked me through a few demos of the assistant working on the smart glasses. I could look at a display of books or some art on the wall and ask Gemini questions about what I was looking at. It felt very similar to multimodal capabilities we've seen with Project Astra and elsewhere.
There were some bugs, though, even in the carefully orchestrated demo. Gemini started to tell me about what I was looking at before I had even finished my question to it, which was followed by an awkward moment where we both paused and interrupted each other.
One of the more interesting use cases Google was showing was Google Maps in the glasses. You can get a heads-up view of your next turn, much like Google augmented reality walking directions, and look down to see a little section of map on the floor. However, when I asked Gemini how long it would take to drive to San Francisco from my location it wasn't able to provide an answer. (It actually said something like "tool output," and my demo ended very quickly after.)
As with so many other mixed reality demos I've seen, it's obviously still very early days. Google was careful to emphasize that this is prototype hardware meant to show off what Android XR is capable of, not a device it's planning on selling anytime soon. So any eventual smart glasses we get from Google or the company's hardware partners could look very different. What my few minutes with Android XR was able to show, though, was how Google is thinking about bringing AI and mixed reality together. It's not so different from Meta, which sees smart glasses as key to long-term adoption of its AI assistant too. But now that Gemini is coming to just about every Google product that exists, the company has a very solid foundation to actually accomplish this.
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Business Insider
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Fast Company
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Why Apple's VisionPro won't make XR headsets mainstream
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Researchers call this the encoding specificity principle —our memories link closely with the environment where they were first formed. With a headset on, our minds don't fully orient to a place, and so we never quite settle in. Apple offers a vast virtual workspace you can take on the go, but that benefit comes at the cost of the sensory richness and physical grounding of a real-world setup. Neuroscience, not just practicality, suggests that working in a physical space—with monitors, windows, textures, smells, and distance—offers deeper engagement and memory retention. Putting the 'Pro' in VisionPro To be clear, XR headsets excel in specific contexts like rehabilitation or short bursts of fully embodied interaction, where body motion tracking is vital. Some content creators might find immense value in a distraction-free, multiscreen virtual studio. But that's not a mass-market audience. XR evangelists may continue promoting VisionPro as the breakout device, but we—and Apple, for that matter—should remember that 'Pro' isn't just branding. It reflects the narrow set of advanced use cases that justify immersion. For most of us, computing still works best in a physical world that engages all five senses. And that's not something XR can replicate—at least, not yet.
Yahoo
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Amazon is investing $10 billion to create data centers in North Carolina aimed at expanding its artificial intelligence and cloud computing technology capabilities. The move, announced Wednesday, is its latest attempt to compete with rivals Google and Microsoft in the artificial intelligence space. It will also significantly boost its presence in the state, creating at least 500 new high-skilled jobs that range from data center engineers and network specialists, to engineering operations managers and security specialists. "This investment supports the [Trump] Administration's vision to strengthen American infrastructure and further safeguard our nation's data," said Shannon Kellogg, Amazon's vice president of public policy. "By creating hundreds of high-skilled jobs and partnering with local communities, Amazon is helping to drive economic growth and advance U.S. leadership in AI." Amazon Introduces Beta Ai Shopping Tool, 'Interests' The investment will also support thousands of other jobs in the Amazon Web Services data center supply chain, the company said. "Generative AI is driving increased demand for advanced cloud infrastructure and compute power, and our investment will support the future of AI from AWS data centers in the Tar Heel State," Amazon said Wednesday in a blog post. "This deployment of cutting-edge cloud computing infrastructure will strengthen North Carolina's position as an innovation hub." Read On The Fox Business App Amazon has been racing to invest in its artificial intelligence infrastructure. In January, Amazon Web Services announced plans to invest an estimated $11 billion to expand its infrastructure in Georgia. Big tech companies have invested tens of billions of dollars in AI. Amazon Rolling Out Ai-drive Alexa+ Service In a 2024 annual letter to shareholders, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said "generative AI is going to reinvent virtually every customer experience we know, and enable altogether new ones about which we've only fantasized." Leveraging this technology is one way to stay competitive, according to Jassy. "If your customer experiences aren't planning to leverage these intelligent models, their ability to query giant corpuses of data and quickly find your needle in the haystack, their ability to keep getting smarter with more feedback and data, and their future agentic capabilities, you will not be competitive," he wrote. FOX Business' Danielle Wallace contributed to this reportOriginal article source: Amazon to invest $10B in North Carolina for AI data centers Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
