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ZDNET Highlights
- Samsung shares the first details of its upcoming AI smart glasses.
- The glasses rely on AI and smartphone integration rather than being a standalone device.
- This will be the company’s first entry into the smart glasses market.
2026 is going to be the year Samsung enters the smart glasses market – and we finally have confirmation direct from the company. during an interview with cnbcA Samsung executive shared details about the company’s upcoming AI smart glasses, including how they’ll work and what they’ll be able to achieve.
Jay Kim, executive vice president of Samsung’s mobile business, discusses AI smart glasses during MWC in Barcelona. Kim shared that the glasses will be released later this year and will have a built-in camera at eye level.
Also: Best of MWC 2026: The biggest news we saw this week
Focusing heavily on artificial intelligence (AI), Samsung smart glasses will likely connect to your phone as part of the Galaxy ecosystem, able to process information captured by the camera.
According to Kim, the glasses will be a gateway for AI to capture and understand what you see, rather than a completely standalone device, so it can feed information to a mobile phone.
“Everyone talks about what the next AI device will be, and I know I’m looking at many different types of devices. Glasses are obviously one of them, and everyone is looking at it,” Kim told CNBC. “I think XR on headsets will continue to exist in a way. But not as a massive business.”
Also: Can Meta see your private life through your Ray-Ban smart glasses? what to know
Samsung last year launched the Galaxy XR, an extended reality headset that includes Gemini for spatial audio, 360-degree views of immersive content, and AI. Yet the new AI smart glasses that Samsung discussed are a whole other business category, one that is growing faster as they get smaller and less expensive.
Companies like Xreal and Meta have already made deep inroads into the smart glasses market with built-in AI experiences, phone integration, and some augmented reality features.
Kim declined to comment on whether Samsung smart glasses will have a built-in display, but all rumors point to the opposite: Samsung says the glasses will feature heavy integration with its phones and the Galaxy Watch, which users can get when they need the screen.
