Just a week after the Steam Frame presented Valve’s vision for VR gaming, Meta is took the stage at Meta Connect 2026.
Rather than a followup to the Meta Quest 3, Meta debuted the Meta VR Glasses, which is super thin and light VR headset that you wear on your face like a regular pair of glasses. The focus on those seems to be professional work and watching movies, but Meta did confirm that there were new VR games coming to the platform. Plus, the entire Meta Quest library will work on the new glasses, though you might have to buy controllers to actually play them.
Beyond the new VR headset, the majority of the event focused on updates to Meta’s lineup of smart glasses. While the existing Ray-Ban Meta glasses will be getting a new generation, Meta also announced Audio Glasses, camera-less smart glasses that are focused on delivering high-end audio.
Of course all of this is built to work with AI, and Meta is going to pair all of it with Muse, its new AI agent. It seems like you will be able to customise Muse quite a bit, but at least based on the live demos, it seems a little rough around the edges. But, that’s of course something that Meta can improve over time.
Meta Connect 2026 Live Blog
All times are in EDT
7:59pm: And that’s the show. We got a whole bunch of smart glasses and a genuinely fascinating VR headset. Again, if they’re able to figure out light bleed, the Meta VR Glasses seem awesome. I just hope that it’s not too aggressive about shoving VR features in your face.
7:58pm: Of course Zuckerberg has a ‘one more thing’, which is ‘Muse Charm’ a handheld AI companion, that you’ll be able to keep in your pocket. This kind of thing has been done a dozen times at this point, though, and it’s hard to imagine the point when you can do the same work on your phone.
7:56pm: Now the real question. The Meta VR Glasses will come out in Spring 2027, and are going to cost $1,299. That’s expensive, for sure, but it is a pretty unique device.
7:54pm: The Meta VR Glasses will also support hologram calling. You’ll be able to call other users, and appear as a full-bodied hologram.
7:51pm: There are actually games coming for this thing! There will be 20 new hands-only VR games coming out, and it also supports the entire Quest library with optional controllers. The Meta store will have a bunch of streaming apps going live later this year, from Disney+ to HBO Max and Hulu. There will also be sports events natively on the Meta VR Glasses.
7:50pm: There’s a live demo, where someone is watching some National Geographic nature documentary. He then brings up his workpace, with the obligatory AI assistant. This one is a test pilot. He then gives a bunch of commands to Muse, and it legitimately takes it 20 seconds to respond. There will probably be more polish before it actually hits store shelves, though.
7:45pm: Of course, the Meta VR Glasses are built for Muse. The AI agent has been built straight into the OS, and you can use speech and gestures to get the agent to perform tasks for you. Or, you can just use your hands as a mouse or even type on it. Zuckerberg claims someone has already managed to reach over 100 wpm on the glasses.
7:43pm: The trailer suggests that the Meta VR Glasses will have the same kind of gesture-based controls as the Apple Vision Pro. A lot of the talk is about image quality. It supports DisplayPort over USB-C, too. It has apparently even inspired James Cameron.
7:41pm: This is going to be a new kind of VR device, in a form factor that’s a pair of glasses “for the first time ever.” They’ve apparently been sitting among the shelves full of AI glasses the whole time. Meta VR Glasses. Again, I’m super curious how these perform, but they weigh just 100g, 1/5th the weight of the Meta Quest 3. “About the weight of a deck of cards.”
7:40pm: Meta has an update for the Ray-Ban Meta display glasses, and it sounds like availability has opened up. They’re going to be available to buy online, and will even launch globally. But there’s one more pair of glasses that Zuckerberg wants to show off, and he mentioned Reality Labs. Finally, some VR hardware.
7:31pm: Meta is introducing audio glasses, that will not have cameras, but are instead focused on delivering high-quality open audio. And they also look a lot thinner, and more like actual glasses. Meta is also updating the entire smart glasses lineup with Meta Ray-Ban Gen 3 smart glasses. They’ll have thinner frames, better battery life and Dolby Atmos spatial audio capture. The latter will let the glasses pinpoint where in the room the audio was coming from.
7:28pm: Hearing Enhancement will turn Meta’s smart glasses into an “FDA-cleared over-the-counter hearing aid.”
7:25pm: Now he’s talking about security, debuting Muse Security VM, which will store your information on a private virtual machine that Meta supposedly won’t have access to. But with Meta’s reputation, I’m not sure if I’d trust that Meta won’t have access to the data.
7:22pm: Zuckerberg has started a second live demo, and this time he’s wearing smart glasses. It finds him a free slot on his calendar. But it’s not just about professional work, but will apparently help you with health and fitness, too.
7:19pm: Now for the live demo. Zuckerberg pulls up his phone, compliments Muse’s toga (really), who then asks him what they’re going to build. He then describes a project and Muse says like it’ll work on it, but Zuckerberg naturally puts down the phone before any of the results are actually displayed. But while he doesn’t show off the results of Muse’s work, he does walk us through changing the agent’s voice to sound more like a cowboy.
7:17pm: Mark Zuckerberg is back on the stage in front of “a whole room full of smartglasses to show us today”. Each of them will apparently be able to let you interact with Muse wherever you are. He mentions that two billion people already have glasses, and seems to think most of them will upgrade to smart glasses apparently.
7:13pm: Muse is going to help you with online shopping, too. Meta is building partnerships with platforms like Shopify and PayPal to let Muse buy things online. I’m skeptical of giving a robot access to my debit card, but hopefully Meta will actually safeguard privacy and data security. It’ll even be able to buy food for you on Doordash.
7:09pm: Alexander Wang, Chief AI Officer at Meta has taken the stage to talk more about Muse. It looks like you’ll be able to customize the way your Muse looks, Wang changed his to look like his dog Euler. It looks like you’ll be able to have Muse fill out documents for you, and can drive any app on your Mac. He emphasizes that this will only be with your explicit permission.
7:05pm: After a long speech about how Meta is popular because it believes in people, Zuckerberg has said that the future of that endeavor is in Muse, which is an AI agent. It is cute, though. Muse will be able to create custom feeds of content for you. But Zuckerberg claims that Muse will be able to make you money, and will be making the agent free for “a large amount of tokens” with the hope that Meta will be able to make a portion of transactions that are processed through Muse.
7:00pm: The show has begun with a live demo of someone working on code and design documents in a VR space. Then there’s a call, with a person popping up in the middle of the screen with some seriously lagging audio. Mark Zuckerberg has taken the stage to talk about the technology that makes ‘creating’ possible. He says “we at Meta, we’re optimists, we believe in the power of people.” I just wish he would take those glasses off.
6:58pm: We’ve now moved from a zoomed-out Meta logo to a zoomed in one with a timer. The show is truly about to begin.
6:50pm: The show officially starts in 10 minutes, and the stream has gone from a still Meta logo to a slightly animated one with ambient music playing in the background. At least Apple’s events have a better soundtrack.
6:30pm: We’re 30 minutes out, and I’m still hoping Meta at least teases a Quest 4 headset.
6:00pm: If the leaks and rumors are to be believed, the headline device this year is going to be a sort of VR headset, but instead of it being closed off like the Steam Frame or the Meta Quest 3, it’ll be worn similarly to regular glasses, but with traditional VR optics built into them. If that’s true, I have serious doubts about how Meta would stop light from leaking in.
5:30pm: Meta Connect 2026 officially starts in about an hour and a half. I’m already bracing myself for a heaping of AI features. But, hopefully we’ll get some cool hardware too.
Jacqueline Thomas
Senior Tech Editor
Jackie Thomas is the Senior Tech Editor at IGN and the PC components queen. She’s been covering gaming hardware for more than a decade for IGN, TechRadar, Gizmodo, PC Gamer and more. You can follow her @Jackiecobra
