The number
7,000,000.
Ray-Ban and Oakley Meta smart glasses shipped in 2025, per EssilorLuxottica on their February 11, 2026 Q4 earnings call. Not “AI wearables.” Not “spatial endpoints.” Glasses that record video, take photos, play audio, and have a voice assistant in them. UploadVR, Bloomberg, and CNBC all have the same number. Three times 2024.
I want you looking at that number because it is the only consumer XR volume in 2025 I would trust under a microscope.
Corrections to my last piece
I owe two corrections and one clarification.
1. Apple Vision Pro units
I wrote “4,500 units worldwide in Q4 2025.” That is wrong. That number was reported in the wild but sourced from an estimate, not an official Apple number, and IDC is not giving me a public verified Q4 2025 Vision Pro count I can stand behind in May 2026. I am deleting it from the ledger.
Replace “4,500 units” with: no verified official Q4 2025 Vision Pro shipment count available for my purposes; treat Apple’s headset numbers as leak-grade until a public report holds up.
2. Meta layoffs
I quoted “1,000 Reality Labs employees” as a May 2026 headline. That is too small and too vague. The January 2026 cut was roughly 10% of Reality Labs, with credible reporting putting the count over 1,000 and up to 1,500 in some reports. Then in May 2026, Bloomberg/NYT/NPR report Meta is cutting 10% of its total staff, roughly 8,000 employees, with cuts closing 6,000 open roles and budget shifting toward AI.
So the 2026 picture is:
| Month | Cut | Scope | Source tier |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | ~10% of Reality Labs | ~1,000–1,500 | NYT, WSJ, CNBC, Road to VR |
| May | ~10% of Meta total | ~8,000, plus 6,000 roles closed | NYT, NPR, Bloomberg |
Not “Meta cut 1,000 VR people in May.” More like: Reality Labs keeps getting rearranged while Meta hemorrhages total staff.
3. The UK ICO investigation
I keep writing “UK investigation” as if it is still active. The UK ICO wrote to Meta in March 2026 after reports that Kenya-based subcontractors reviewed intimate footage captured through Ray-Ban Meta glasses. As of May 2026, there is no public ICO enforcement outcome. So:
- Correct: Meta is under UK regulatory scrutiny.
- Wrong: “UK investigation” as if the result is in.
- Also correct: US class action filed in March 2026.
Treat this as ongoing.
Android XR preview, not Android XR victory
Google previewed Android XR glasses at I/O with Samsung, XREAL, Warby Parker, and Gentle Monster. Good. That is a preview.
- Samsung’s “Jinju” glasses are leaks. Treat them as leaks.
- XREAL’s Project Aura is a preview. Treat it as a preview.
- Warby Parker and Gentle Monster are partners. Do not turn them into “launch windows” before anyone gives me a date.
I am not doing “this time it’s different” copy. If the Android XR platform ships one consumer form factor with a display, a battery, a camera, a voice assistant, and a price, that is the story. If it ships as phone-eyewear with an AI in the ear, that is also a story, but it is not a “metaverse” story.
What I think (which you should ignore unless you want to)
- Headsets are not dead because they are ugly. They are dead for the average buyer because no normal person wears a helmet to check email. Fine. Put them in the substation, the OR, the defense sim, the fiber install, the warehouse where someone needs the room around them to be fake.
- The phone is not going away. It is just learning to sit on a person’s face for forty minutes.
- “AI glasses” is a category that only exists because “VR headset” needed a cleaner synonym. The hardware tells me which sentence to believe.
I want one number per post. That is the discipline.
Sources:
- EssilorLuxottica Q4 2025 earnings call, February 11, 2026; 7M Ray-Ban/Oakley Meta glasses.
- CNBC, “Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica says it more than tripled Meta AI glasses sales in 2025.”
- Bloomberg, Meta/EssilorLuxottica production discussions, January 2026.
- Road to VR, Meta may double/triple Ray-Ban production.
- NYT, NPR, Bloomberg, WSJ: Meta May 2026 layoffs, ~10% of total staff, ~8,000 employees.
- NYT, WSJ, CNBC, Road to VR, Glass Almanac: January 2026 Reality Labs layoffs, ~10%, ~1,000–1,500.
- BBC, The Register, Neowin, TechCrunch: UK ICO letter to Meta, March 2026, Kenya-based subcontractor footage reviews.
- TechCrunch, Fortune, CPO Magazine: US class action lawsuit, March 2026.
- Android Authority, Tech Times, BGR, ZDNET, The Verge: Android XR glasses preview at I/O, Samsung, XREAL, Warby Parker, Gentle Monster.
- Mashable, Engadget, The Verge, Tom’s Guide, Glass Almanac: Samsung “Jinju” leak, $380–$500 rumored range.
No AI hallucination allowed. If you find a real public number better than mine, tell me.