Meta Connect 2025: What we expect and what we don't

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Meta Connect 2025 starts on Wednesday. This is what we think we’ve announced and what we’re not.

The company’s annual meeting, which typically announces new hardware and major software and content updates, will be held on September 17th and 18th this year.

Meta’s main keynote description simply states that Mark Zuckerberg “shares the latest AI glasses and lays out the meta vision of artificial intelligence and metaverse.” And last month, Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth teased “The Big Wearable Announcement,” AI and “Metaverse Software.”

Meta’s CTO teases what to expect in Connect 2025

Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth teased what to expect at Meta Connect 2025 in September.

Beyond this ambiguity, Meta covers her lips tightly with what to expect. However, understanding the meta strategy with a set of reports from reliable sources means that you can make reasonable predictions about what to expect.

However, we could be wrong, and the only way to actually find out what Meta announces is to look at Connect Keynote.

Smart Glasses

Monocular HUD glasses

Bloomberg’s Markgarman, The Barge, Information, Financial Times, and CNBC all report that Meta will be releasing smart glasses with a small head-up display (HUD) in the right eye.

To be clear, this is not AR. The report suggests that a small HUD will display time, weather, notifications, frame and preview photos, display the captions and translations of actual speeches, and optionally display meta AI responses as text instead of audio.

Meta HUD glasses are rendered to leaked early firmware.

According to the information, the addition of the HUD brings HyperNova to about 70 grams compared to the 50 grams of Ray-Ban Meta Glass.

In July, the rendering of HyperNova and its wristbands was discovered in early firmware on a public meta server, with the engraving displayed in one of the renders, revealing the product’s name, Meta Celeste.

Mark Garman said in April that Meta plans to sell its products for over $1,000, but last month the company reported that it had decided to sell it from $800.

We expect Meta’s HUD glasses to be the main focus of Connect 2025.

Oakley Meta Sphere Glasses

Meta and Essilorluxottica recently launched the Oakley Meta HSTN glasses, but essentially it is a slightly higher-end version of the Ray-Ban Meta, with high-resolution video recording and longer battery life.

a **Non-smart** Model of Oakley spaera glasses.

According to Mark Garman of Bloomberg, this year it’s not an Oakley Meta collaboration. Garman reports that both companies are working on the glasses based on Oakley Spaera designs, with the camera in the center.

The central camera is ideal for first-person footage, and the product is reportedly sold to “cyclists and other athletes.”

Next-generation Ray-Ban Meta Glasses?

Meta’s HUD glasses are products that are much higher priced than mainstream Ray-Ban Meta glasses and are not alternatives.

But can you also see the Ray-Ban Meta upgrade? I disagree with the report.

Back in May, the information reported that the codenames for the next generation of Ray-Ban Metagrass are Aperol and Bellini, and are planned for 2026. The upgrade includes the ability to recognize faces and run consecutive “time” AI sessions.

However, in July, a group on social media in China, called the XR Research Institute, published a clear rendering of the next generation of Ray-Ban Metaglasses, showing a clear design of optical glasses and sunglasses. And the group insisted that a new model should be launched. this year.

Given that Meta and Essilorluxottica have launched the Oakley Meta HSTN glasses, it seems unlikely that Meta will drop the true next generation just by minor upgrades to the Ray-Ban Meta at a higher price of $100. But given how popular the glasses are, it’s within the realm of the possibility that Meta and Esiloluxottica have accelerated their plans.

Glass SDK (some kind)

Regardless of which meta is not on sale or launching in Connect 2025, it’s clear that some kind of SDK for developers is inbound.

The schedule includes three developer sessions held on the second day under the title “Meta’s new developer toolkit will be announced on September 18th.”

All three sessions have phrases in their LinkedIn profiles, such as “helping bring apps into AI-powered smart glasses like Ray-Ban Meta,” and are working on “software integration with external stakeholders from Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley Meta Glasses.”

Additionally, last month, CNBC reported that Meta reached out to third-party developers to build a “experimental app” for HUD glasses.

What’s completely unclear is exactly what the Meta Smart Glasses SDK will take.

Given the very limited calculations of the glasses themselves, one possibility is that the SDK will be server-side and developers can build integrations of meta AI rather than the meta AI itself, which resembles Alexa skills.

Headset & Horizon OS

No new quest headsets

For the first time since Connect 2021, when Facebook renamed Meta and presented its vision for Metaverse, we are not expecting the company to launch a new quest headset.

Meta and LG were once scheduled to ship the spiritual successor of Quest Pro, but that was delayed until at least 2027 last year, and was cancelled earlier this year as LG officially halted its efforts to commercialize XR products (the company is still continuing its background R&D).

Our sources suggest that Meta’s next headset will be an ultra-lightweight open perimeter with a tethered computing pack running Horizon OS, which they hope to ship in the second half of 2026.

ASUS ROG headset?

I’m very confident that the meta itself says it won’t launch a new headset this year, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the new Headset Running Quest system software and store won’t be displayed.

Last year, when branding the Quest operating system as Horizon OS, Meta announced that third-party hardware companies of their choice could also be used in headsets, starting with Asus and Lenovo.

The ASUS headset was called the “performance gaming headset” of the company’s Gamers Republic (ROG) brand, but Lenovo is clearly working on a line of “productivity, learning, and entertainment” headsets.

In January, VR enthusiast Luna received a hint with obvious details about the ASUS ROG headset. According to that tip, the headset is called a thallius, and uses a QD-LCD panel with face and eye tracking and with local dimming or micro-all display.

I haven’t seen any leaks or reports indicating that the Asus Rog Horizon OS headset will be released this year. Additionally, the release may be made at an ASUS event rather than a meta event. But it’s at least within the realm of potential teasing in Meta Connect 2025.

Last year – some people have discussed it in response to Apple Vision Pro – Meta can overhaul and place it freely, keep it open while inside an immersive app.

But what Horizon OS doesn’t have yet is the system-wide functionality to share these windows with others.

The latest PTC (Public Test Channel) builds of the operating system add the ability to permanently pin Windows to an overhauled VR homespace. And Luna’s Horizon OS data mining suggests that these windows can be “shared” with others visiting your home soon.

The ability to share 2D Windows with others is a fundamental feature of Apple’s Visionos in Vision Pro, called SharePlay, and I expect Meta to tinker with some kind of equivalent in Connect 2025, if not fired.

Publicly published questions include how the company handles DRM and other copyright issues, as well as the quality, reliability and latency of features at the technical level.

A new big hit VR game?

What I saw a lot of people wondering about Connect 2025 is whether we’ll see Meta unveil a new, first-party, blockbuster VR game coming.

For us, that doesn’t seem like that. In recent years, Meta has decided to release titles for its blockbuster titles in the summer. Originally its own Meta Quest Game Showcase event, he has recently appeared at wider gaming events such as Batman’s Gamescom: Arkham Shadow and Deadpool VR’s Summer Game Fest.

Deadpool VR is set to launch only Quest 3 and Quest 3 on November 18th, and we expect this to be the only blockbuster VR game in the meta to be released this year. Also, Meta may bundle Deadpool VR with new purchases of Quest 3 and/or Quest 3, like Batman: Arkham Shadow.

That’s not, of course, that Meta isn’t working on a new, blockbuster VR title. The voice actor for Arkham Shadon’s Commissioner Gordon confirmed last month that a sequel was about to enter development.

Batman: Arkham Shadow Review – Triumphant Return

Batman: Arkham Shadow is a great return for the Dark Knight, and it cleverly adapts the Quest 3 and Quest 3 VR series.

It’s possible that Meta will tease the sequel to Arkham Shadow in Connect 2025. However, given the long development cycle of games like this, the company may be hoping to wait for future Connect for that.

Valve steam frame?

Another thing that could happen during Meta Connect is the announcement of a new Valve headset.

To be clear, we don’t mean in Meta connects itself, but we mean meanwhile. In 2019, Valve set up an embargo for first impressions on the index, and in 2019 F8 In 2019, Mark Zuckerberg opened pre-orders at a Facebook meeting where pre-orders were opened for Rift S and Oculus Quest.

Valve’s relationship with Meta has clearly improved over the past six years, but it definitely won’t rule out Valve, who tries to steal Meta’s lightning again.

Over the past four years, Valve has repeatedly confirmed that it has been working on new headsets, strongly suggesting it will focus on wireless streaming from PCs. At this point, many references to valve headsets called “Deckard” were found in SteamVR code, and the “Roy” controller model was discovered later last year.

Last week, Valve was applied to the trademark of the term “Steam Frame,” and both SteamVR Datamining and Valve Leakers suggest that this could become the Deckard product name.

Another possibility is that Valve launches the SteamVR link dongle, which was also discovered in the SteamVR code. This increases the reliability of wireless PC VR on all standalone headsets.

The main MetaConnect 2025 keynote will be streamed on Wednesday at 5pm Pt, and the developer keynote will be streamed on Thursday at 10am.

UploadVR is located on site at Meta’s headquarters. We strive to fully cover all the biggest announcements.