Meta AI Glasses Gain Certified Hearing Enhancement, Joining EssilorLuxottica in Making Hearing Aid Glasses

Last week, Zuckerberg announced at Meta Connect 2026: Meta AI glasses gain a Hearing Enhancement feature, which has passed relevant U.S. official certification and can compensate for mild to moderate hearing loss.

On cost, according to information found by Xingqiu, users who have already purchased Ray-Ban Meta Audio or Gen 3 must pay a one-time fee of $149.99 to activate the feature. It is also included in Meta's paid subscription bundle (Meta One / Meta One Premium), which users can subscribe to in order to unlock and use it.

Around the same time, overseas brand Nuance Audio launched a pair of hearing glasses called Nuance Audio Plus. Like Ray-Ban Meta, the glasses integrate hearing aids into the temples and have received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) clearance.

Interestingly, Nuance is a brand under EssilorLuxottica. As is well known, EssilorLuxottica has partnered with Meta to create well-known AI eyewear brands such as Meta Ray-Ban.

Image source: The Hearing Review

However, unlike the Meta Ray-Ban second generation, priced at $379–499, these Nuance Audio Plus glasses cost $829, twice as much as the Meta Ray-Ban second generation. That price suggests it is closer to a professional medical device.

An estimated 1.6 billion people worldwide are affected by hearing loss, including about 1.25 billion with mild to moderate hearing loss, yet nearly 90% of this group use no hearing intervention. Nuance Audio Plus aims to fill that gap by embedding hearing assistance in an everyday pair of glasses.

Hearing aid module. Image source: Nuance

Compared with the brand's previous-generation smart glasses, the Nuance Audio Plus adds: stronger sound amplification, making it more practical for specific uses; clearer voice quality; and battery life extended to up to 10 hours. Folding the smart glasses puts them to sleep to conserve battery, and the product also comes with a wireless charging pad for convenient charging anywhere. (A more powerful wireless charging case is available for an additional $149.)

Because there is no need to cram in a camera or pile on a host of AI features, Nuance Audio Plus actually looks like an ordinary pair of eyeglass frames, making it far more discreet than other smart glasses.

The product comes in three frame styles: Square, Pathos, and Upturn, and five colors: olive green, dark blue, amber, glossy black, and glossy burgundy.

The glasses can be fitted with any optical lenses, including Transitions photochromic lenses that adapt to changing light. Pairing them with prescription lenses, however, raises the price accordingly.

Image source: Nuance

The Nuance Audio Plus glasses work with Nuance's smartphone app, which offers customizable settings to improve speech clarity.

Image source: Nuance

The glasses offer two main modes: front-facing and omnidirectional. Front-facing mode focuses on face-to-face conversations (using directional microphones with beamforming to improve speech clarity by helping the wearer focus on the person directly ahead), while omnidirectional mode amplifies all surrounding sounds.

Like many dedicated hearing aids, these smart glasses filter background noise at different levels depending on the environment. The glasses offer four noise-reduction levels.

Hands-free call management is a new highlight of the product line: when paired with a compatible iPhone, users can answer and manage voice calls directly through the glasses frame.

The glasses also feature an all-new frame control function, including a dedicated power button and volume keys on the temples. A double tap on the frame quickly switches audio modes, without needing to pull out a phone. The frame also adds Bluetooth for the first time, letting users take calls with ease. Users can still configure and manage these functions through the Nuance Audio App.

Image source: The Hearing Review

Although many wireless earbuds today, including popular products such as Samsung Galaxy Buds, have received FDA clearance to serve as hearing aids, building this accessibility feature into smart glasses as a core selling point remains a fairly novel idea.

Stefano Genco, global head of Nuance Audio, said in a press release:

"The market response to Nuance Audio glasses has been extremely positive, confirming that consumers are looking for a more natural, more engaging way to access hearing support. In the past year alone, we have expanded to 14 countries and more than 18,000 stores, reaching a consumer group that is on average five years younger than traditional hearing aid users, two-thirds of whom had never been aware of traditional hearing aids. With the launch of the new-generation product Nuance Audio Plus, we have taken another major step toward making hearing support a natural part of everyday life."

Clinical studies of the device show that in extremely noisy environments, wearers' speech recognition improved by 29% and perceived listening effort decreased by 32%.

"With Nuance Audio glasses, we want to shape the future of early hearing care," Stefano Genco said in the press release. "Our vision is to make hearing care as easy and natural as wearing a pair of regular glasses."

Currently, both partners, EssilorLuxottica and Meta, have launched medically certified hearing glasses under their respective brands. This shows that both companies are bullish on this market, seeking to address the urgent needs of the hearing-impaired and to solve the problem that AI glasses are "not a must-have." At the same time, the further extension of AI glasses' service scenarios also means that more smart consumer electronics will cross over and disrupt traditional medical devices in the future.

Text by R星人

       Original title : Disruptive impact! Why are Meta and EssilorLuxottica making hearing glasses at the same time?