Wearable

Audio Balance and Mono Audio, announced at Meta Connect, are rolling out now, 9to5Google reports. It also says a couple of navigation upgrades are now “broadly available as an update in the Meta AI app,” including turn-by-turn Pedestrian Navigation and a feature for sharing your location from your phone with your glasses.

The $80,000 MRG-D5000 features a case and bezel made of ultra-tough sapphire crystal as part of Casio’s “Blue Rose Project” collection, as reported earlier by Wired. Casio is only releasing 20 of these luxury watches, which come with solar charging, radio-controlled timekeeping, water resistance up to 200 meters, and 24-carat gold lettering.

The Android XR glasses, designed in partnership with Gentle Monster and Warby Parker, were announced in May, with new designs revealed at Unpacked in July. Now The Korea Herald reports they’ll hit the market some time in November, citing confirmation from a Samsung official.

The July Digital Markets Act ruling required Google to share search data with rival search engines by January 2027, and give third-party AI assistants equal access to Android by that July. Google’s Oliver Bethell told Bloomberg that sharing user search data “would cause irreversible harm to user privacy.”

In the works since earlier this year, plans to go public were only announced a week ago, but are already on the rocks. The smart ring company blames the postponement on “uncertainty in the IPO market,” and CEO Tom Hale suggests it will still go ahead eventually:

The blood pressure trends, insulin resistance trends, and sleep breathing quality metrics mentioned at the 2026 Made By Google event weren’t available when the Pixel Watch 5 launched last month, but now Google says they’ll start rolling out to Watch 3 models and later this week. You can set them up in the Google Health app, and trend reports will arrive in “early October.”

The Verge cofounder got an extended sit-down with the Meta CEO at Connect yesterday. They covered “pervert glasses” and privacy, AI assistants and agents, and what exactly is going on with the Metaverse. He defends the company’s track record on privacy, and its future privacy plans: “More of the things that Meta is going to do going forward are going to look like WhatsApp.”

Des Yap did some initial testing of the new $649.99 T-Rex Dual Solar from Amazfit — the first endurance watch with a bright and colorful OLED to be fitted with teeny-weeny solar panels. The ring around the display can extend life a bit, but the larger rear panel around the heart-rate sensor can add a few percentage points of charge when you arrive at camp, or when the watch is slung off a running vest, so maybe you can leave your ultralight power bank home on your next multi-day adventure.

If you’re worried about the green LEDs being a bigger distraction in a dark theater now that the Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4 measure your heart rate every five seconds, Theater Mode now reduces readings to five minute intervals while still silencing alerts and keeping the screen off. But you can override that new feature in the Apple Watch’s settings to restore the continuous monitoring.

They’ve opened “at least one criminal probe” following complaints about the glasses being used to film women on the street in public without their consent, Reuters reports. France’s data protection authority also says businesses are “increasingly” asking if they can ban smart glasses at work, similar to a ban under consideration in Australia.

Late last night, we published my video about trying Snap’s Specs AR glasses at the company’s headquarters. The hardware, which costs $2,195, is interesting, but the experience of actually using them was rather finicky. Despite yesterday’s splashy launch event, the Specs also don’t yet have a firm release date beyond sometime this fall.

Spiegel just wrapped us up. I got to try the Specs, check out my story!

Heap is a Specs “visionary” (a celebrity partner), and she’s interacting with digital elements she can see in the Specs to make a song in real-time. It’s all very sci-fi.

Spiegel is trying it out now. He’s been flipping through a virtual book to try out different experiences, and got a letter from a virtual owl that was “sitting” on his arm. He’s also doing a Wingardium Leviosa spell.

The “SPECS First Look” opens at Westfield Century City in LA on October 1st, where you can “experience SPECS in person, meet members of the team, and check out what we’re building,” Snap says. Meta has also used pop-up shops as a way to show off its hardware.

The case, available as part of a bundle for $2,395 (a $200 increase over the Specs on their own), gives you an option to more easily get internet while wearing the Specs. In the US, Snap is working with Verizon to offer data plans and financing options.

After a brief interlude about how Specs can work in enterprise environments, Spiegel is pitching how Specs can help you learn things. Spiegel is down a live demo showing himself practicing drawing. He’s using a real pen to trace a digital alien mascot that’s layered over a real piece of paper.

I usually can’t see his eyes — they’re hidden behind the digital content he’s looking at.

We’ll see how this goes! Right now, he’s showing some menus, including quick access items that he pulled up by looking at his palm.

He’s giving an overview of the Specs AR glasses, which were initially announced in June. He says we’ll get live demos.

Made a friend walking in the door. I should have asked what he’s looking at.