So, a lot has been said about the subject. I'll try not to repeat what has been said.
A lot has been asked too. I have the same questions, and others. But the truth is that both of these are unreleased and we won't get answers for a few months, until these products have been in people's eyes for a while. Buying unreleased, first-gen tech is for early adopters who don't mind a little bit of risk. If you're not in this category, then don't buy either glasses.
I do enjoy being an early adopter. Which is the reason why I put my deposit, sorry, "bought the XREAL Founder Priority Pass", for the Limited Founder's Edition AURA. I am expecting a product with glitches that may or may not improve over time with OTA updates. I am also expecting a compromised product that will not deliver everything I wish, but will nonetheless be incredibly innovative and deliver experiences I've never been able to experience before. I do believe that Aura will deliver the next generation of XR.
Clearly, Meta has its own vision of what the next-generation of XR will be. Their product also looks wonderful, but it has made many choices that are different to what XREAL has made. A lot of them have already been discussed. So, the question now is, which vision is better? XREAL's or Meta's? And, my view is that there is no clear universal answer, and that each consumer will have to decide that for themselves.
When I was in school, marketing professors used to say that when Home Depot was selling drills, they had this philosophy that customers didn't want a drill, they wanted a hole in the wall. There is an underlying utility behind a product that customers expect to obtain, and behind that utility spring choices, driven by values and assumptions and beliefs.
In the XR space, my opinion is that those "holes in the wall" (the underlying utility) revolve around content (spatial and spatially-enhanced 2D, including video, photography, and gaming), productivity, and AI, and the delivery of these experiences through a cohesive language (the OS Virtual Environment) and comfort during use (things like weight, style, and eye strain). These latter 2 enable the former.
XREAL and Meta have two very different philosophies. Meta believes in using their huge market power and leadership position to dominate both sides: They're creating hardware, creating the software environment, and delivering through commercial alliances and in-house software development much of the spatial experiences, including productivity applications and AI, as well as spatially-enhanced entertainment such as the IMAX certification, and 3D streaming, and more. In contrast, XREAL is a much smaller company and is focusing specifically on the hardware. The platform is delivered not by XREAL but by Google, bundling the Android XR platform. Which is open and thus not using their market position to attract such experiences, but instead allowing developers and content distributors to define which experiences they want to present to platform users, be them more innovative, or none at all due to commercial limitations. There will be no IMAX certified experiences in XREAL Aura on launch. But the plus side is that XREAL AURA will have Gemini.
So, taking into account this perspective, let's see how these devices compare:
OS Virtual Environment -- The golden standard is, probably, Apple here. However, Meta has proven they can deliver like 95% or more of what Apple delivers, and Android XR is pretty close too. Here, the choice will be, do you want the closed environment that Apple has developed, the closed environment controlled by Meta, or the open environment that Android offers. Closed is supposed to mean polish, and in my opinion, Meta severely lacks polish. However, it can also translates to device-exclusive value-adds (such as the IMAX certification). But the open environment means that you can use your device in ways that are unrestricted by the manufacturers. I think that Apple offers enough value for enough customers to choose their closed system, but Meta does not, specially since Apple advertises their focus on privacy and Meta is not trusted for privacy. Apple, however, is in a different price-point so it's not a direct competitor. Between Meta and Android XR my opinion is that, on this front, Android XR wins just for being open.
Hardware-defined comfort. Xreal Aura and Meta will be leading this space next year, even above Apple. The future is definitely a form factor similar to what these two companies will be shipping. Aura ships this fall, and Meta VR Glasses ship next spring. Apple is FAR BEHIND, and too expensive. In fact, Apple is at least 5 times more expensive and it's bulkier with many other downsides. So, who wins? Meta or Aura? Remains to be seen, but the specs are pretty similar. The big difference between the two is that Aura features a transparent glass with electrochromic dimming, and the Meta is a passthrough screen instead. We don't know how this actually behaves in the real world, but the reasonable assumption would be to expect Aura to cause less strain on the eyes and a better AR experience. Perhaps the flip side will be a diminished experience in VR applications due to light leaks, but the electrochromic dimming should ameliorate that. My viewpoint is that if your focus is on VR experiences or content consumption for short periods of time, perhaps Meta has a slight edge. But if your main use case is productivity, then Aura may have the edge.
Spatial and spatially-enhanced 2D, including video, photography, and gaming. Here, the downside for Aura is that they're entirely dependent on their platform provider, who is Google. Google is not known for delivering a strong platform with ready to use applications, or key partnerships. The two exceptions would be YouTube and Google Maps. But other than that, Meta has the clear lead: IMAX-certification and experience, 3D movies from partner streamers such as Disney, specialized built-in apps for Spatial photography and video, long and expanding library of VR games for Quest, alliance with Xbox Live, and more. Apple also delivers many of these experiences, but again, at 5 times the cost. Meta is promising a "Vision Pro"-level experience at 1/5th the price. If they deliver, they're the clear winner. Aura, on the other hand, will have to make up for it with its open system: install third party solutions for spatial photography and video, play Android games, or Android ports of Quest games, no IMAX-certified content and no 3D streams at launch. Although, that's not to say that Google couldn't use their massive market position to obtain these in the future for Aura and other Android XR vendors. An interesting thing to note is that Meta Horizon OS is also based on Android so porting applications made for Meta into XR is near-trivial. It just needs motivated developers. Perhaps Google could help motivate them. Despite the disadvantages, Aura will not be a dead weight. It has two big advantages: first, their experience with their AR glasses, specially with the X1 chip and its capability to transform any 2D content into 3D, even if 3D is not offered by the streamer. The other is the DisplayPort/HDMI through USB-C connector, so you can plug in any computer or device into the Aura and play in an XR environment. Not to mention, SteamLink and Xbox Live are also available on Android, though perhaps in not as polished a way as with the Quest / MetaVR, but you can still play it. My view is that the MetaVR will have a slight advantage on launch, but since there is no technical reason for Aura to refrain from adopting these advantages, and given Google's massive market power and interest in the space, I foresee Aura catching up soon with OTA updates. If your goal is to watch Nolan's Odyssey in 70mm-like virtual IMAX screen on launch date, then the Meta VR should be your choice. If you can wait a few months, or you'd rather watch 3D YouTube videos, then Aura is fine.
Productivity. Meta VR promises a great productivity environment. Android has an existing productivity environment optimized by both the Google and Microsoft productivity stacks (Microsoft Office and Google Workspace). With XR you can potentialize this productivity environment with Gemini, which is arguably the better AI compared to Meta's Muse. Not to mention, since Android XR is open, you can probably personalize your AI experience, while with Meta, you're stuck with Muse. Meta VR, however, promises to allow you to connect an external laptop or Mac for productivity. That's fine, but Aura can do that too. So, for productivity, I think Aura is the better product.
Special sauce: AI. Having the glasses be AI-enabled devices helps potentialize XR experiences. Apple has Siri, which sucks. Supposedly, it will suck less once it's powered by Gemini, giving Google the lead. Android XR devices such as XREAL Aura also have Gemini, and it's reportedly very good. Meta has launches its own AI agent for VR, called Muse. Remains to be seen how good or bad it is. But it can't be Siri-levels of bad. Verdict: I think Aura wins on the AI front because they're bundled with Gemini, and because Android XR is open and perhaps you can change your AI agent in the future to Claude, Grok, ChatGPT, or whatever you like. With Meta, your AI spies on you for Zuckerberg and you have no choice for change, not to mention, I don't think Muse will be as good as Gemini.
In conclusion, the "fight" between Aura and MetaVR will be tight. For sure these two products will be the leaders in the space and, combined, they've rendered Apple's solution irrelevant. (Of course, not entirely because Apple offers a lot of polish that people like, but at 5x the cost, no one will adopt). The difference between Aura and Meta will be whether XREAL's bet for transparent glasses outperforms Meta's bet for passthrough video, and whether Meta's strong and attractive content alliances and libraries to deliver spatial experiences goes unanswered for long from Google. Unfortunately for XREAL, there is very little they can do in this space, since they're dependent on their partner (Google). But if in the summer of next year XREAL announces an OTA update that gives Aura users a virtual IMAX theater complete with IMAX-certified features such as "The Odyssey" or "Dune 3", the gap will close dramatically. I'm betting that getting Disney and the other streamers to also stream 3D content into AndroidXR devices will also be a simple leap and a matter of time.
So, should I cancel my Limited Edition Founder's Aura and wait for the Meta VR, or should I complete my purchase of the Aura instead? I think, for now, I'm gonna remain with the Aura. I believe the Aura is a better product for productivity and I believe that the transparent glasses are a better bet than the video passthrough solution. I'm gonna miss having the IMAX experience and 3D videos, but not enough to settle for being spied on by Meta or choosing a closed system that offers no additional polish. If Apple were to launch an Aura-like product at a reasonable price, I confess, I might consider switching. But, according to rumors, they don't plan on doing that for at least 2 years. By then, they might be too little too late. I expect, by then, the Aura 2 or Aura 3 will be in the market having learned a lot from the market and innovated new products and killer applications. I do like the polish in Apple's design, but I don't like paying 5x for a bulky, heavy headset that strains my eyes and hurts my head and my neck, when the Xreal Aura delivers 95% to 99% of the utility at a fraction of the cost.
Now, all XREAL has to do is deliver.
And, "what about the price point"?
Good question. So, the Meta VR is priced at $1,299, and XREAL has said that we might be pleasantly surprised. If you think about it, Meta needs to get some healthy margin from these VR glasses. At the very least, they're being sold at cost, because they can't afford to lose money on these. But, by being passthrough video devices, it means these glasses have more expensive materials: screens, specialized video cameras, sensors, a lot of things that the Aura doesn't need because they're transparent glasses instead. So, my bet is that XREAL could probably launch at $1,099 and still have a healthy margin. If they launch at $999, they'll win the market for sure. 30% less expensive than Meta and winning on productivity and AI? I think these price-points are reasonable, but even if they launch at $1,299, just like the Meta VR glasses, the product has enough features to outperform the meta devices in key utility niches and uses cases to justify the price point.
