Is there a practical future for smart glasses?

When will mobile phones be completely replaced? This may be a question that many readers have thought about. Smart watches are not widely used and their functions are not complete enough, so it is difficult for them to bear the burden of "replacing mobile phones" in a short period of time. Therefore, some companies are pinning their hopes on another product, that is, smart glasses that look very high-tech.

On September 14, Xiaomi officially announced the launch of a new concept product - Xiaomi Smart Glasses Explorer Edition. From the appearance, this pair of glasses is not much different from our common glasses. Xiaomi officially claims that "put it on and the picture will jump out in front of you". In simple terms, this pair of Xiaomi smart glasses can project certain specific information into the wearer's field of vision in a special way. So can the launch of Xiaomi smart glasses reignite the craze for smart glasses?

What are the uses of Xiaomi smart glasses?

According to Xiaomi's official analysis, the Xiaomi Smart Glasses Explorer Edition is equipped with a quad-core ARM processor, battery, touchpad, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth modules and other components, runs the Android operating system, and weighs 51g. In order to display the image on the smart glasses, Xiaomi uses MicroLED optical waveguide technology, hiding the sesame-sized MicroLED micro-display in the frame, and through advanced optical waveguide lenses, the light is reflected and diffused countless times, and finally transmitted to the human eye.

However, for smart glasses, being able to display images is only the most basic requirement. If it cannot play any substantial role, it can only be called a gimmick product and has no practicality. Therefore, Xiaomi integrated 497 micro sensors and communication modules into the glasses, and has a quad-core ARM processor, battery, touchpad, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth module, etc., running the Android operating system, making it a smart terminal with independent operating logic.

As for the functions, according to the promotional video released by Xiaomi, we can preliminarily understand that this pair of smart glasses has five main functions: message notification, answering calls, map navigation, taking pictures and voice translation.

What Xiaolei is more interested in is the navigation function. From the picture, we can see that Xiaomi smart glasses can not only display maps, but also time, speed, and estimated arrival time/distance. Compared with the navigation on mobile phones and watches, smart glasses are better in safety and convenience. For those who need to ride frequently, they may be a necessity. Xiaolei will not go into other functions one by one.

However, this video also reveals some problems. For example, the display area of ​​the Xiaomi smart glasses is only on the right lens, and the displayed color is only a single green. Long-term use may cause eye fatigue. At the same time, considering that its body weight is only 51g, it is basically impossible to equip it with a large battery. Therefore, in terms of battery life, the performance of the Xiaomi smart glasses may be difficult to satisfy users.

Most importantly, although Xiaomi's smart glasses are just a concept product, they still follow the framework left by Google Glass nearly ten years ago. Strictly speaking, it is not a product created from scratch, at most it is a comprehensive upgrade of Google Glass.

Smart glasses are not new

In fact, smart glasses were born as early as 2012. The one that impressed Xiao Lei the most was Google Project Glass. From the appearance, Google smart glasses look like a product from the future. It concentrates people's imagination of wearable devices. It is equipped with many components such as cameras, displays, speakers, microphones, etc.

Google's glasses are like a wearable smartphone that allows users to take photos, send messages, and run other functions through voice commands. Although it looks really cool and basically meets the needs of users at the time, the immaturity of display technology and the price of $1,500 make it difficult for the market to accept it. Rather than being a smart glass, it is more like an expensive high-end toy.

Therefore, Google announced in 2015 that it would stop selling the first version of Google Glass and shut down the Explorer project. For various reasons, Google Glass not only failed to become an industry pioneer, but also became a "victim" of smart glasses.

However, Google has not given up on its in-depth research on smart glasses. In 2019, Google released the second generation of Google Glass. Compared with the first generation, the main target audience of this pair of glasses has changed from ordinary consumers to professionals such as surgeons and technical workers, and the price has also been reduced to US$999. According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2012, approximately 46 million Americans are engaged in industries that require the assistance of wearable devices, and by 2022, this number will grow to 52 million. The prospects for smart glasses are very broad.

But its shortcomings still exist: it lacks an ecosystem and applications, many specific functions require companies to develop and customize them themselves, and it is difficult for individual users to experience and unleash the full potential of the two glasses.

In addition to Google, companies like Microsoft and Facebook have also entered the smart glasses market, but their products are all in the commercial market and have not changed the plight of lacking practical value in the consumer market. Is it true that no company can make a pair of smart glasses that consumers can accept?

Apple may be able to change the market, and the industry speculates that Apple smart glasses may be released in the next two years or so. When users put on the glasses, they can present movies, maps and other content. After taking off the glasses, these AR functions can be immediately displayed on the iPhone.

Compared with companies like Microsoft and Google, Apple's biggest advantage is that its ecosystem is complete enough, which may provide more usage scenarios for smart glasses. Users will buy when they see a complete software ecosystem, the market scale will expand, the R&D costs will decrease, and the price will gradually drop, thus forming a positive cycle.

Will smart glasses replace mobile phones?

In any case, if smart glasses want to be accepted by the market, the most important thing is to control the price to a level that ordinary consumers can accept. Before the price drops to the level that consumers expect, smart glasses will be difficult to popularize, and it is impossible for them to replace mobile phones and become the next generation of smart terminal devices that everyone has.

In Xiaolei's opinion, what will replace mobile phones in the future will not be any single device, but a system composed of multiple products that can communicate with each other, such as mobile phones + watches + glasses + headphones that have evolved into local computing centers. Whether it is Xiaomi smart glasses or Apple AR Glass, they are only a small part of this system. Judging from the performance of current products and the size of the market, it is absolutely impossible for them to become the so-called next-generation personal smart terminal.

However, we cannot say that Xiaomi's smart glasses have no practical significance at all. Although current smart glasses have not been able to play their maximum value and it is difficult for consumers to pay for them, its birth can make more consumers pay attention to the smart glasses market again and is likely to promote changes in this industry.