Meta Connect 2025: What to expect, how to watch

Meta’s annual Connect conference is where the company establishes its agenda for the coming year — and beyond — holding up new hardware, AI advances and developer tools as evidence of its sprawling efforts across gaming, work and community building. Look for a strong focus on AI wearables — particularly smart glasses — in addition to updates on the state of the Quest ecosystem, the metaverse and Meta’s far-reaching AI strategy.

Why this Connect matters for Meta’s wearable ambitions

Meta has transformed smart glasses from a curiosity into a growth bet. The company says it has sold millions of Ray-Ban Meta units, and this year it expanded into sport-focused models with Oakley. Meanwhile, Meta Superintelligence Labs, led by artificial intelligence veteran Alexandr Wang, signals an appetite to go beyond chatbots and into ambient real-world assistants. This Connect is set to connect those threads.

Analysts have long ranked Meta as the market-share leader in consumer VR, according to a firm called IDC, but its broader story has come to be about AI that lives on your face or wrist and comprehends context. That reframing — from a pure headset-first metaverse — will shape what Meta unveils and how developers design for it.

Smart glasses steal the show with AI and EMG control

A now-removed video seen by UploadVR indicated a new class of Ray-Ban Meta glasses that would include a right-lens HUD and onboard cameras and mics as well as live AI help. The leak cited a wrist-worn controller — teased at a previous Connect — that reads small hand and finger signals through electromyography for delicate, low-friction input.

Reports from CNBC have also hinted at a Hypernova codename, and launch in tandem with that EMG wristband. If true, this combines two long-standing issues: quick private input without voice and glanceable output without whipping out the phone. Think turn-by-turn cues while biking, coaching prompts during a workout, or instant translation in a crowded street.

Expect Oakley to feature prominently. According to industry word on the street, all indicators are that it would follow Sphaera’s enough-is-plenty deal — the one with a wraparound lens and a camera tucked away dead center for ease of use by athletes — that rips out twenty grams in weight from the loaded frames while creating better wind dynamics. The bigger question will be software: Will Meta’s assistant do critical tasks on the device for speed and privacy, or rely heavily on the cloud? Considering Meta’s known focus on low-latency inference and power efficiency, a hybrid approach is probable.

VR and the Quest roadmap for hardware and software updates

Don’t be surprised if Quest hardware is second fiddle to glasses this year. A longer-horizon ultralight VR headset connected to Meta, meanwhile, could be in the cards, and near-term updates could land on the software side: more polished passthrough mixed reality, better room understanding and tighter integration between Quest and smart glasses for handoff across contexts.

For developers, keep an eye out for enhancements in scene capture and free-hand tracking as well as performance tooling. Even small Quest upgrades count: A faster mixed reality pipeline opens up everyday usage beyond gaming, which is important if Meta hopes to keep consumers engaged between new hardware cycles.

AI strategy: From Llama to everyday assistants

Connect is also Meta’s way to stage its AI stack. Look forward to updates across Llama models, the Meta AI assistant and the company’s work on in-house silicon. Meta has said that it is working on a custom Meta Training and Inference Accelerator in previous briefings, and any advancements there would tell us how much on-device intelligence to expect from wearables this cycle.

The strategic throughline is clear: multimodal AI that sees, hears and reasons about your environment. That’s real-time object recognition, context-based prompts and conversational guidance that is sensitive to user privacy. Seek concrete commitments on data handling, opt-in visual processing and developer access to computer vision APIs without requiring potentially compromising uploads.

How to watch the keynote and sessions across platforms

The main keynote is free to watch via Meta’s event portal and will require a short registration. The company also streams on its developer presence on Facebook, and typically has an immersive watch party in Horizon for Quest owners. If you want to watch in VR, make sure to install the latest headset software, RSVP for the Horizon event and enable captions in settings if you need them.

A Dev Keynote follows the main one, offering more in-depth information on SDKs, AI tooling and mixed reality features. Among the research conversations scheduled is one with Reality Labs execs Michael Abrash and Richard Newcombe, discussing “glasses with contextual AI” and Meta’s vision of post-smartphone computing. Narrated replays and tech breakouts typically end up on the web a short time after the live sessions.

What to listen for during Meta Connect announcements

Smart glasses features and privacy considerations

• Battery life claims and real-world endurance
• Daylight display brightness
• Camera resolution and field of view
• How Meta handles on-device versus cloud processing
• Clear signals when cameras are in use, plus strong permissions and fine-grained controls for visual AI features

Developer priorities, APIs, and hardware timelines

• New APIs for wristband EMG input
• Improved multimodal capture capabilities
• Pricing or ship windows for any new hardware
• Third-party partnerships around fitness, navigation and translation
• Commitments to support wearables in the enterprise and warranty service

Meta Connect has expanded from its origins as a VR showcase to a broader computing summit. If the company is able to match capable hardware with useful, privacy-respecting AI and compelling developer economics, it could do for smart glasses what it did for smartphones: turn them from a curiosity into a daily habit.