Meta AI Glasses Might Be Prompting Outrage, But People Are Buying Them

When Kylie Jenner posted about her collaboration with Meta Glasses—making a pair of £359 opticals that can tell you everything from the weather forecast to what to make for dinner in her voice—a lot of users saw red. "SAY NO TO SURVEILLANCE CAPITALISM," posted one. "The people don’t want this," commented another. The biggest objection seems to be that as well as incorporating Meta AI, meaning you can ask questions on-the-move, and the ability to translate more than 20 languages with a simple voice command, you can "capture memories hands-free" (read: secretly take photos of your food without judgment or, more worryingly, another person).

@everybodyhateselon

The Instagram account @everyonehateselon has dubbed them "pervert glasses", with its own ad that depicts a pair on the face of Jeffrey Epstein. Its tagline speaks volumes about how the accessory is being perceived by its critics: "Glasses for people who don't do consent." Others are coming up with clever ways to "hack the system". An Instagramer user called @marie4pole posted: "Women are being advised to play Disney songs when they notice a man is recording them with Meta glasses without consent." Her conclusion? "Because apparently music is more protected than women in 2026."

The language that's being used to object to these glasses, and their technology, has been notable. "Fascism chic for summer," Gabriella Karefa-Johnson wrote on her Substack Brain Matter, referencing the launch party thrown by Meta (in attendance? Kylie Jenner, Timothée Chalamet and Mark Zuckerberg, who accessorised with a pair of, you guessed it, Meta glasses). "Need some of you to get a single scruple and F A S T. Stroking the surveillance state for an open bar and dj-set is just sad ):," continued Karefa-Johnson. Spying, gathering intelligence and giving citizens the power to operate covertly in plain sight? This might sound like a dystopian thriller set in the Cold War, but it's happening today—right under our noses.

EssilorLuxottica, who owns the eyewear brands Ray-Ban and Oakley, has beat its profit forecasts not in spite of its tech glasses but because of them. According to a report by Reuters, published on the Business of Fashion: "Franco-Italian eyewear maker EssilorLuxottica reported a 15 percent rise in first-half adjusted operating profit on Tuesday [28 July], comfortably beating analysts’ expectations, while revenue growth was ⁠driven by strong demand for AI-enabled glasses ⁠and products in its myopia management portfolio."

If you're glasses-shopping at Meta—where you can choose between spectacles and sunglasses made by Meta itself, Ray-Ban or Oakley—myopia might not even come into the equation. The BoF article continued: "The Ray-Ban maker made adjusted operating profit of €2.75 billion ($3.13 billion) in the six months to June 30, compared with a Visible ⁠Alpha analyst consensus of €2.46 billion."

The hype machine is clearly working. For as many people who are voicing their concerns and calling them "creeper glasses", as one person did underneath another photo of Kylie Jenner, others are being influenced: "Obviously bought them already!!! 😍," reads the comment directly underneath.

Maybe the entire debate is, in fact, moot—and, like driverless cars, they'll be not so much a choice but an inevitability in the future (at least for those who can afford to keep up with technology). Mark Zuckerberg certainly seems to think so. In June 2025, Fortune reported on the following comment made by the Meta CEO. “I think in the future, if you don’t have glasses that have AI or some way to interact with AI, I think you’re kind of similarly, probably [going to] be at a pretty significant cognitive disadvantage compared to other people and who you’re working with, or competing against."

Technological advances that make people's lives more "advantaged" are inevitable. But if the billionare makers behind them (as well as the promoters like Kylie Jenner; also a billionare), haven't considered what the consequences might be for more vulnerable members of society if they are misused, then it's not just a failure of responsibility but potentially dangerous. I've worn glasses for short-sightedness since junior school, have owned at least seven pairs (of all descriptions) since and can say with a degree of certainty that one of Meta's—even the cat-eye style of Kylie's—won't be telling me the "feels like" temperature anytime soon. Call me a Luddite, or a person at a "signature cognitive disadvantage"—that's fine—but a pair of glasses doesn't need to find me a recipe or take a photo of the resulting dish.

Natalie Hammond is a writer, editor and author who’s contributed to publications including Marie Claire, Elle, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Who What Wear, The London Standard, CNN and The Times. She was most recently senior fashion news editor at Grazia, and previously worked on the fashion desk of The Times. Her first book was published in August 2024, Bowie: His Style Principles, which is part of an ongoing series about world-famous wardrobes. She writes the Substack How Much?, a newsletter examining the culture of shopping.