Specs: Snap details its augmented reality glasses, expected in France this autumn

The facts

Snap, Snapchat’s parent company, gave a detailed presentation of its Specs glasses on 16 September 2026 in Los Angeles, at an event hosted by its co-founder and chief executive, Evan Spiegel. They are standalone augmented reality glasses: the computer is built into the frame, with no compute unit or phone to connect. Through transparent lenses, they display images over the surroundings, up to a virtual screen that Snap compares to a 115-inch cinema screen (2.9 metres diagonal) placed about 3 metres away.

Specs cost $2,195, with a refundable $200 deposit on pre-order. A $2,395 option adds a charging case with a cellular connection. In the United States, the data plan costs $10 a month for Verizon customers and $20 for everyone else. The partners are Orange in France and EE in the United Kingdom. Deliveries are due to begin later in autumn 2026 in these three countries, and a try-on space will open on 1 October 2026 in the Westfield Century City shopping centre in Los Angeles.

In France: the glasses cost €2,295, or €2,495 with the 5G-connected case, according to Univers Freebox; Orange is to sell them in about 500 of its shops, with deliveries announced for autumn 2026.

The technical specifications were given in June: 132 or 136 grams depending on frame size, a 51-degree field of view, up to four hours of mixed use (the case provides four additional charges) and two Qualcomm Snapdragon processors. An LED lights up when the glasses are filming, and Snap rules out any facial recognition.

Snap is also launching Specs Intelligence, an “anticipatory” AI service: based on the apps you choose to connect, it prepares a meeting or a trip, for example, without waiting to be asked. It works on iPhone, on Mac and in the glasses. For now, only an iPhone preview is open, to over-18s in the United States; the Mac version is invitation-only. Snap undertakes not to use this personal data to train its models or to target advertising.

The announced partners include YouTube, Spotify, HBO Max (with a Harry Potter experience), the NBA and the WNBA, Shopify and Tripadvisor. A translation feature displays subtitles in 60 languages.

The context

Snap has been selling glasses since 2016. The first Spectacles simply filmed short videos for Snapchat; the company misjudged demand and lost millions of dollars on unsold stock.

The following generations served as a testbed. The fifth, released in 2024, was reserved for developers, to prepare a consumer version. In June 2025, Snap announced Specs for 2026, stating that it had invested more than $3 billion in the project over eleven years. The price and pre-orders followed in June 2026, at AWE, the augmented reality trade show.

Why it matters

Specs sit between Meta’s Ray-Ban Display glasses, at $799, and Apple’s Vision Pro headset, at $3,499. Their bet: a complete computer on your nose, with no wire or compute unit, that lets you see the real world instead of replacing it. France is among the first three countries to be served.

Success is far from guaranteed. The specialist site Social Media Today notes glasses three times heavier than an ordinary pair of sunglasses, and the precedent of Spectacles calls for caution about demand. Snap, for its part, sums up its philosophy in one sentence: computers should make humanity “more important, not less”.

Archive note

• Presented on 16 September 2026 in Los Angeles; $2,195, or $2,395 with the cellular case; €2,295 in France.
• Deliveries planned for autumn 2026 in the United States, the United Kingdom and France (partner operator in France: Orange).
• 51-degree field of view, 132 to 136 grams, up to four hours of battery life.