Beat Saber will get a huge update to go with the newly announced Meta VR Glasses next spring, headlined by Flux, a brand new game mode. The update will also add full hand tracking support, a first-ever rewards system, and an enhanced single-player campaign.

Announced during Meta Connect, developer Beat Games will deliver the biggest update it’s ever produced for one of VR’s most popular games. Here’s the trailer:

There’s a lot of new content coming, so let’s break it down one by one.

Flux, A New Game Mode

Flux is a new game mode that dispenses with the titular sabers and turns your hands into weapons. You will use new techniques like the Flux Tether, which channels power between your hands to slice through notes in time with the beat of the track. The tether also powers each hand separately to punch through other note targets and build up Jolt energy. When enough energy is built up, you can squeeze your fists while slicing notes to trigger Jolt and a score boost.

Flux will launch for the newly announced Meta VR Glasses and Quest with thirty-five songs curated from Beat Saber’s existing catalog of original soundtracks (OSTs) and Anniversary packs, including tracks from Lindsey Stirling, Teminite, Camellia, and Boom Kitty alongside in-house tracks from Jaroslav Beck and Zakka G.

Flux is primarily intended for hand tracking, but will have Touch controller support as well for those who prefer it. More Flux songs are planned for post-launch updates.

A Refreshed Single-Player Campaign & User Interface

Beat Games has revamped Beat Saber’s original single-player campaign, introducing a ‘light narrative element’ to follow as your note-slicing skills are progressively tested. You will be faced with new barriers and missions to complete and unlock exclusive in-game rewards.

Beat Saber’s user interface also gets a refresh to get players into game modes or browsing the new content faster. An improved first-time player experience will teach newbies the ropes of Beat Saber to help them start chasing the leaderboards.

For The First Time Ever, A Rewards System & Enhanced Progression

A new rewards system will grant players brand new cosmetics like different sabers and notes. You can also display your achievements and customize your profile with new profile badges and banners.

All of this is contained in a new inventory system allowing you to quickly swap things in and out to further make your Beat Saber experience your own.

No Controllers Required

The Flux update emphasizes a new change for Beat Saber. The entire game will be playable with hand tracking.

This move would have been unthinkable a few short years ago when hand tracking accuracy was not yet good enough to keep up with rapid hand movements. The new Meta VR Glasses will not ship with controllers, so a flagship title like Beat Saber being unplayable on it would not have been a good look. This does not change or replace Beat Saber’s traditional controller support.

This update will drop in Spring 2027 for Meta VR Glasses and Quest.

A hand-controlled, room-aware mixed reality version of Tetris Effect is coming to Meta’s new VR device, Quest 3 and 3S.

Tetris Effect: Mixed Realities is a new hand-controlled and room-aware mixed reality version of Tetris Effect that was announced today. The game will launch on Meta’s newest VR device, Meta VR Glasses.

The new Tetris seeks to take advantage of Meta VR Glasses’ key features, allowing you to control the entire game with your hands, while the device’s passthrough cameras use the geometry of your room, lighting and visual effects to transform the world around you.

From Pong To VR: Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s Quest To Make Games That Move You

With Lumines Arise launching this November on PS VR2 and Steam, we interviewed Tetsuya Mizuguchi about his career and how Enhance are approaching this new entry.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Tetris Effect is a modern reimagining of Tetris designed by Tetsuya Mizuguchi and his team at Enhance, Resonair, and Monstars, which combines traditional Tetris gameplay with reactive music, particle effects, and environments that respond to the player’s actions.

Originally released on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation VR in 2018, it came to Quest in 2020. An updated version with multiplayer called Tetris Effect: Connected was released on Steam in 2021, while a free update was made available for the existing PlayStation VR, Epic Games Store, and Quest releases. A PlayStation 5 / PSVR2 release followed in 2023.

Tetris Effect: Mixed Realities is coming to Meta VR Glasses, Quest 3 and 3S in 2027.

A new VR release in Capcom’s visual novel adventure series brings courtroom drama to Meta VR Glasses and Quest in 2027.

Announced today alongside the new Meta VR Glasses, Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies VR is a new made-for-VR release in Capcom’s popular Ace Attorney series.

In Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies VR, you’ll use the unique capabilities of VR to examine crime scenes, build your case, and take it to court. The game uses hand-tracking to present evidence and point at or call out witnesses. Voice-activation control allows players to shout the series’ infamous “Objection!!”

A trailer was released during Meta’s keynote, and that’s embedded below:

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies VR is the first VR game in the long-running series, which began life in 2001 on Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance before finding worldwide sales success with subsequent releases on the Nintendo DS. Since then, 11 games have been released in the Ace Attorney series.

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies was originally released for the Nintendo 3DS in 2013, and was the fifth main entry in the series. It was also released for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows in 2024 as part of the Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy compilation.

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies VR is coming to Meta VR Glasses and Quest in 2027.

Dragon Grove, a relaxed, mixed reality 3D puzzle game, comes to Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3 in Spring 2027.

The new game from veteran developer Schell Games (Among Us 3D, I Expect You To Die) will launch free-to-play with in-app purchases. Dragon Grove was announced at Meta Connect today.

Here’s the trailer:

In Dragon Grove, you will match and grow magical dragon plants and unlock dragon abilities from a puzzle-box-like structure in mixed reality with full hand tracking support. You can also interact with your adorable pet dragon.

The 3D puzzles will ramp up in difficulty as you progress, introducing new mechanics and plant types the deeper you go into the game.

The game will launch for free with all of the expected elements that come with a free-to-play title including daily streak rewards and in-app purchases including hats, accessories, and power-ups for your dragon.

Dragon Grove can be wishlisted now on the Meta Horizon Store. It launches in Spring 2027 for Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3.

Dragon Grove, a relaxed, mixed reality 3D puzzle game, comes to Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3 in Spring 2027.

The new game from veteran developer Schell Games (Among Us 3D, I Expect You To Die) will launch free-to-play with in-app purchases. Dragon Grove was announced at Meta Connect today.

Here’s the trailer:

In Dragon Grove, you will match and grow magical dragon plants and unlock dragon abilities from a puzzle-box-like structure in mixed reality with full hand tracking support. You can also interact with your adorable pet dragon.

The 3D puzzles will ramp up in difficulty as you progress, introducing new mechanics and plant types the deeper you go into the game.

The game will launch for free with all of the expected elements that come with a free-to-play title including daily streak rewards and in-app purchases including hats, accessories, and power-ups for your dragon.

Dragon Grove can be wishlisted now on the Meta Horizon Store. It launches in Spring 2027 for Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3.

Cozy hand-tracked mixed reality farming simulator Story of Seasons: Your Wonderful Life was announced at Meta Connect today for Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3.

Here’s the trailer:

Cozy life-simulation gamers have been vastly underserved in VR, with only a handful of games like Garden of the Sea and Medieval Dynasty: New Settlement available to scratch that itch and the latter title features a healthy dose of combat. Meanwhile, games like Stardew Valley, The Sims, and recently Nintendo’s Pokopia have collectively sold tens of millions of units across their respective platforms.

In other words, it is a largely untapped market that can serve to make VR/MR more appealing to a wider audience that remains uninterested in combat or chasing leaderboards. Story of Seasons aims to help fill in that gap. The game is single-player only and is said to be launching with fifty hours of content.

In Story of Seasons, you will tend to your fields, care for your animals including cow-milking and sheep-shearing minigames, harvest crops, and head into town to fill requests and get to know your local residents. As shown in the trailer, you can also meet a partner and start a family.

Story of Seasons – Your Wonderful Life can be wishlisted now for Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3 on the Horizon Store.

Meta’s annual XR and AI focused Connect conference is in full gear this week. The biggest news dropped during the opening keynote, while day two will feature the Developer State of the Union keynote.

Watch the Meta Connect Developer State of the Union Keynote on September 24th at 10AM PT (your timezone here)

On day two of Connect, Meta is hosting its Developer State of the Union keynote which is more focused on developers. We expect to hear the latest on developer tools (especially AI-based tooling), programs, and features to make it easier to build content for Meta’s glasses and headsets. You can watch the livestream embedded above.

Watch the Meta Connect Keynote From Day One

Meta Connect 2026 kicked of with its usual opening keynote which saw the reveal of the company’s newest ‘VR Glasses’. Check out the first round of coverage:

• Meta Announces ‘VR Glasses’ Next-Gen XR Headset, Priced at $1,300
• Meta VR Glasses Hands-on: What Apple Vision Pro Probably Should Have Been
• Meta Ray-Ban Display is Finally Rolling Out Internationally Starting Today
• ‘Beat Saber’ is Getting a Big Hand-tracking Update Next Year, Ditching Blocks for Orbs & Rods

Beyond the headlining keynotes, the Connect 2026 agenda includes additional sessions along four tracks: VR, AI glasses, AI, and Horizon. Meta has confirmed all of these sessions will be viewable on-demand online once released.

The post Watch the Meta Connect 2026 Developer State of the Union Keynote Right Here appeared first on Road to VR.

Announced today at Meta Connect, Cardmada is a hand-tracked, free-to-play tactical card battler set in a Wonderland-inspired world coming to Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3.

Said to be ‘designed from the ground up for natural hand and eye interaction,’ Cardmada has you take command of a pirate ship, recruiting a crew of misfits to combat rival captains in head-to-head battles. You will build poker-inspired combinations of cards to trigger cannon attacks and outmaneuver your opponents to victory.

There was not a lot of additional information provided, but looking through the provided screenshots (see below), the game clearly has mixed reality support and the unlockable rewards you would expect to see in a free-to-play title.

Concept art provided by Meta depicts different ship types and three character archetypes: Skullywags, Queen’s Armada, and Whisperwakes.

Cardmada can be wishlisted now on the Meta Horizon store for Meta VR Glasses and Quest 3.

Dice Throne Digital is a free-to-play adaptation of the popular fantasy-themed tabletop strategy game coming to Meta VR Glasses & Quest 3 with crossplay support across XR devices, mobile, and PC. It is expected to launch in early 2027.

Announced at Meta Connect today, Dice Throne Digital spatializes the popular dice-and-card game, which has sold over 1.5M physical copies worldwide and raised over $18M across multiple crowdfunding campaigns.

You will compete with other players in a fantasy-based battle, embodying your chosen heroes and rolling dice to trigger their special abilities and playing cards to manipulate dice rolls in your favor. Attacks will play out in front of you on a mixed reality tabletop board.

The original tabletop game has forty-five different heroes as of July 2026, spread across multiple seasons and crossovers with Marvel including the X-Men, Black Panther, Black Widow, Deadpool, Captain Marvel, and Doctor Strange. We do not know if these will carry over to Dice Throne Digital. The images provided to us show several original characters pictured below.

With the game being free-to-play, we expect new cards, dice, and characters to be unlockable through a combination of playtime rewards and in-app purchases.

You can wishlist Dice Throne Digital on the Meta Horizon store now.

Meta VR Glasses were just officially announced. Priced at $1300, they have 2.4K micro-OLED displays, weigh 100 grams, and are powered by a tethered puck with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Reality Elite chipset.

The puck runs the same operating system as Quest 3, and supports all the same content, rendered at notably higher resolution thanks to a combination of the more powerful chipset (essentially an XR2 Gen 3 by a different name) and eye-tracked foveated rendering. It features 12GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, and there’s a microSD slot in the puck to expand it.

The caveat to the content compatibility is that Meta VR Glasses will not come with controllers by default, but you’ll be able to buy Touch Plus controllers separately (available in a new all-black color), or pair the controllers from your existing Quest 3 or Quest 3S, and there’ll be a bundle with controllers “in some retail channels”.

Qualcomm Announces Snapdragon Reality Elite, Its New Flagship XR Chipset

Qualcomm just announced Snapdragon Reality Elite, its new flagship XR chipset, and it will debut in the compute puck of Xreal’s Aura Android XR device this fall.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

The stark difference between Meta VR Glasses and any Quest, however, is the split architecture, and the dramatic reduction in weight and bulk this enables.

Meta VR Glasses have no onboard computing, not even a tracking coprocessor, and thus entirely rely on the 300-gram puck, which is roughly the size of two phones stuck together and provides both power and data over a thin and flexible hybrid fiber optic cable.

Meta VR Glasses have an open-periphery design, so you naturally see the real world to your sides and below you. The frame is built with a magnesium alloy that minimizes weight while also enabling a fanless, passively cooled design that weighs “around” 100 grams.

Another key difference is the display and field of view. With dual 120Hz 2412×2288 HDR micro-OLED displays, Meta VR Glasses have the highest resolution of any Meta headset to date, and are the company’s first non-LCD headset since the original Oculus Quest in 2019.

The device supports the Dolby Vision HDR format, and Meta says it’s the first VR product to be IMAX Enhanced certified.

The form factor brings a major optical compromise, though: the field of view. Meta advertises 70° horizontal × 66° vertical (equating to ~87° diagonal) compared to the roughly 110° horizontal × 96° vertical of Quest 3.

The narrower field of view makes Meta VR Glasses feel far less immersive than a Quest headset when the optional light blockers are attached for fully immersive experiences. But, somewhat ironically given the name of the product, Meta VR Glasses should shine without the light blockers in passthrough mixed reality, where a natural view of your periphery is often preferable to darkness.

Meta plans to market the product as “a private cinema, multiple monitor workspace, and game console in one device that fits in your bag”.

Essentially, Meta VR Glasses at its core is the same market proposition as the Xreal Aura Android XR device but with a VR-style passthrough display system that offers a larger field of view (~87° diagonal vs Xreal’s 70°), higher resolution, and full opacity, alongside the inclusion of eye tracking and optional tracked controllers. We do not yet know the price of Xreal Aura.

To expand the library of content available to Meta VR Glasses owners who don’t buy Touch Plus controllers, Meta announced a swathe of new hand tracking VR and mixed reality games, including a new hand-tracked Beat Saber mode called Flux. You can read about the gaming announcements here.

For the first time for a Meta standalone device, you can also plug in any USB-C DisplayPort device to the puck, including a phone, laptop, or gaming handheld, and have it shown as a virtual screen, without the need for a capture card.

Every New Game & Game Update Announced For Meta VR Glasses

Several new games are coming to Meta VR Glasses as early as Spring 2027, alongside major updates to existing games.

UploadVRJames Tocchio

Meta VR Glasses will also feature the first implementation of Hologram, the company’s realistic avatar tech. Similar to Apple Vision Pro’s Personas, it will both let you join flatscreen WhatsApp video calls as a photorealistic face-tracked avatar, and appear as a full-scale realistic avatar in calls with other Meta VR Glasses (and eventually Quest 3) owners.

However, at launch in spring, your spatial Hologram will be a stereoscopic video stream, not volumetric. It displays at true scale, but is only seen as a front-angle view. Even if you change your perspective, the Hologram will stay as a head-on perspective, like billboarded assets in a video game. Meta says it plans to evolve Hologram over time post-launch to become a truly 6DoF 3D system, at which point it will become the default platform-level avatar experience for its VR platform, effectively superseding the cartoon Meta Avatars.

Meta has finally unveiled its next-gen mixed reality headset, Meta VR Glasses. While they could technically fit somewhere in its Quest lineup, Meta seems to be making a concerted effort to bridge the gap between its experimental augmented reality projects, like Orion, and its much bulkier Quest gaming platform.

Previously known as ‘Project Phoenix’, Meta VR Glasses are a compute puck-tethered device which are going on sale sometime in Spring 2027, priced at $1,300. You can check out the full specs and launch details here.

I got a hands-on preview of VR Glasses at Meta’s big annual Connect developer conference, giving me a chance to get to grips with the new gaze and hand gesture-based UI, get an early feel for ergonomics, and experience the most pixel-dense display Meta has ever sold.

Meta VR Glasses Visual Experience

After a long stint of LCDs from Meta, we’re finally getting proper micro-OLED panels. You’ll find the full specs here—but it bears mentioning that VR Glasses are visually impressive: 5.5MP (2,412 x 2,288) per-eye resolution at 37 pixels per degree (PPD), with a refresh rate up to 120Hz.

That class-leading pixel density comes at a tradeoff though: its 70-degree horizontal field-of-view (FOV) is noticeably smaller than Quest 3’s 110-degree FOV, which some may find frustrating on the face of things.

The display’s black are predictably deep, there’s no noticeable OLED smearing, and panels are sufficiently bright—maybe not as bright as I would have hoped, although I suspect that had more to do with the fact that I didn’t try it with the optional light blocker accessory Meta will ship when VR Glasses go on sale next year. Ambient reflections and lighting stole a little bit of the perceived brightness.

The color passthrough view on VR Glasses is the best I’ve seen on a standalone VR headset, as I saw no noticeable stitch lines, no appreciable latency, good color reproduction, acceptable brightness, and seemingly zero weird bendiness of the environment or near-field objects which is somewhat common of Quest headsets.

It’s really approaching the threshold of ‘passthrough as a genuine reproduction of the environment’. Combined with its sharp and much brighter displays, I’d consider Meta VR glasses streets ahead of the cadre of AR devices with birdbath optics that seek to achieve the same end with optical passthrough: using your world as a backdrop for content.

The impressively compact pancake optics of VR Glasses are also very clear, although the sweet spot isn’t as large as Quest 3, requiring you to find a good fit with the array of supplied nose pads and choose the actual Meta VR Glasses size that’s right for your head (between a ‘Standard’ and ‘Large’ variant of the device). No data yet on what that means substantively in real-world measurements. More on that below. IPD is easily adjustable by physically moving the lenses inwards or outwards independently, supporting 56-70 mm IPD in addition to prescription add-ons.

That makes VR Glasses the first Meta headset to support asymmetric IPD adjustment, though asymmetric adjustment can be difficult to calibrate correctly, compared to using an IPD dial on the outside of the headset.

Performance

That pocketable compute puck, which needs to breathe through a mesh grill at the top for active cooling, packs in a battery rated for up to three hours, powering a Qualcomm Snapdragon Reality Elite processor (XR2 Gen 3), which is up to 11% higher max GPU frequency vs Quest 3’s Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 2.

When they offered me to play Beat Saber, I thought “ah ha, my perfect apples-to-apples comparison,” but alas, it was actually a new hand-tracked mode coming to the game called ‘Flux’. This mode completely reimagines the gameplay, making it all about punching and garrote-wiring flying bars in half with an energy beam connected to both hands (as opposed to slashing blocks).

VR Glasses won’t come with controllers in the box, but it is compatible with the same Touch Plus controllers that Quest 3 and 3S use today. With them, the headset can play all existing content from the Horizon store, including the traditional block-slashing Beat Saber mode.

Back to performance: there was one graphically demanding scene that showed off the new chipset likely working at full bore; select film content will include an immersive theater of sorts, which are actually fully rendered bespoke environments that change according to what’s happening in the film.

I was watching a clip from Avengers: Infinity War, as Peter Dinklage’s character is forging the all-mighty Stormbreaker axe. It’s admittedly a cool gimmick, because I don’t expect all films to get this sort of treatment, but I was watching Dinklage forge from inside his forge. Star power blasting away, steam rising from grates, particles flying everywhere in a fully-rendered environment as the film kept up at what I suspect was probably somewhere south of 4K native playback.

Comfort & Audio

A half-hour demo is a poor basis for understanding long-term comfort for any device, even for a 100g headset that does its level best to be the all-day productivity headset… er… glasses. In Meta’s own words: “the weight is over.”

That said, I tried on both the small and large versions, notably two different SKUs, and found the large to be very comfortable. Initially, I started with the small, but it clamped too hard on the sides of my head, and kept slipping from my nose as a result. Both small and large are shipping with multiple nose pads, although I’m hoping Meta shores up their messaging on actual sizing before launch, since I would be pretty miffed if I bought the small and I had no reasonable way of finding out before buying.

Another thing I didn’t count on was the real value add of the downward-facing sensors. Sitting down, I could put my hands in my lap and do all of the UI gestures without having to Wingardium Leviosa in front of my face constantly. That includes looking to highlight, pinching to select, and swiping your index finger with your thumb to scroll, all of which just felt right.

Eye-tracking appears to only be for UI stuff for now, although I’m betting we’ll hear more about what sort of streaming and rendering tech has gone into the compute puck, and how eye-tracking informs that.

Audio is the same (or maybe even slightly better) experience you’ll have with Meta Ray-Ban Display, which include off-ear speakers that comes with the usual trade-offs. Less bass, acceptable mids and treble, and the usual audio bleed. If I were on a plane (where this thing wants to be) I would most definitely opt for headphones and the optional light blocker, which clips in for a more immersive (and less light bleed-y) experience.

Value Proposition

Meta seems to be forging a new path with VR Glasses. While they could conceptually fit somewhere in its Quest lineup, they appear to represent a more concerted effort by Meta to bridge the chasm between its Display glasses, experimental augmented reality projects, like Orion, and its much bulkier Quest gaming platform.

Meta VR Glasses are an interesting mid point between the still elusive all-day AR glasses of the near future, and the much heavier, and less compact VR headsets of today. It’s attempting to bridge that gap by being slim and light (~100g on-head weight), and by offering some of the best color passthrough I’ve seen on VR device yet.

In the end, it feels like Meta purposefully reframed the device by not calling it something like, I don’t know, ‘Quest Air’.

And at $1,300, the appeal is pretty clear: Meta wants prosumers and productivity-minded people to look at VR Glasses not only as a jack of all trades, but one that doesn’t take up half of your carry-on, or weigh too terribly heavy on your head like its main competitors, Apple Vision Pro and Samsung Galaxy XR.

Disclosure: Meta provided lodging for one Road to VR reporter to attend Meta Connect 2026 where information for this article was gathered.

The post Meta VR Glasses Hands-on: What Apple Vision Pro Probably Should Have Been appeared first on Road to VR.

Meta today unveiled its long-awaited next-gen mixed reality headset: Meta VR Glasses.

Previously known under the codename ‘Project Phoenix’, Meta VR Glasses was announced today, but isn’t launching just yet; the compute puck-tethered device is slated to go one sale sometime in Spring 2027, priced at $1,300.

While we’re still waiting on a precise release date, Meta did reveal an avalanche of details on the hardware alongside a slate of new immersive and casual viewing content coming to the headset. You can catch Road to VR’s hands-on with Meta VR Glasses here.

Meta VR Glasses – Hardware

Meta VR Glasses feature what the company is calling its ‘5K Infinite Display’, which uses micro-OLED panels, offering a 5.5MP (2,412 x 2,288) per-eye resolution at 37 pixels per degree (PPD)—notably higher than Quest 3’s 25 PPD.

In fact, despite being significant lower resolution than Vison Pro’s 11.7MP per-eye resolution, Meta says VR Glasses has a higher PPD (34 vs 37) because VR Glasses spreads its pixels over a tighter field-of-view of about 88° diagonally (H70° × V66°).

That’s not the only thing that’s smaller. Meta VR Glasses weigh about 100g on the head, as the battery and compute have been moved to a separate puck connected to a proprietary port via an optical cable.

Inside that pocketable puck (~300g) is Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon Reality Elite processor (XR2 Gen 3) and a battery with a claimed 3+ hours of mixed use. The puck can also be used charged while in use, when plugged into its included 45W USB-C power supply.

Lenses can be manually adjusted for a interpupillary distance (IPD) range between 56–70mm, and can also be fit with prescription inserts from Meta partner Zenni Optical.

As for sensors, VR Glasses comes with a wide array: eye-tracking cameras for UI selection and biometric unlock, front and downward-facing camera sensors for a wider hand-tracking range, and full color passthrough sensors offering 26 PPD. It of course also does the same capable 6DOF spatial tracking pioneered in the company’s Quest lineup.

Like its Meta Ray-Ban Display smart glasses, Meta VR Glasses support a mix of gaze and hand gestures: look to highlight a button, pinch your fingers together to select, rub your thumb up or down, or side to side to scroll through content.

While that mix of eye and hand-tracking is its main input scheme (i.e., not shipping with physical controllers), Meta VR Glasses do support Quest’s Touch Plus controllers, which the company says you can either buy separately or actually use from your existing Meta Quest 3 or 3S.

Meta is also baking in Surface Keyboard—released earlier this year on Quest—to turn any flat surface into a keyboard and trackpad, which comes in addition to being able to pair Bluetooth peripherals like keyboards, gamepads, and more.

Meta VR Glasses are being offered in two sizes (for different head sizes), Standard and Large, which are notably two separate SKUs. Only one storage option has been announced thus far: 128GB internal storage with the option to expand up to 1TB via the puck’s microSD card slot.

When they do launch next spring, Meta VR Glasses are targeting broad international availability, with supported regions including: US, UK, Canada, Mexico, Germany, Poland, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, Iceland, Finland, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand.

Meta VR Glasses Specs

Meta VR Glasses – Software & Games

Meta VR Glasses run the same OS and store as Quest, so the entire Quest catalog of VR games and apps are there.

At least in terms of gaming without Touch controllers, Meta has promised 75+ games and apps optimized for hand gesture input, with its headliners including a modified version of Beat Saber for hand-tracking, 3D puzzle game Dragon Grove, courtroom sim Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Dual Destinies, and a modified version of Tetris Effect for hand-tracking.

Meta says all of your usual streaming apps will be there at launch: Disney+ and Peacock, both with 3D, plus HBO, YouTube, Prime Video and more. Other streaming services can also be accessed via the built-in browser.

Meta VR Glasses is also technically an ‘IMAX Enhanced’ certified VR device supporting Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos immersive spatial audio, which means you’ll be able to watch select films in IMAX’s exclusive expanded aspect ratio.

Outside of casual gaming, video, and 180-degree immersive sports content, which you also find on Quest, Meta is leaning particularly hard into productivity.

The device supports wireless multi-screen virtual desktop streaming from Mac, PC or phone, opening it up to be more of a general computing device. Native DisplayPort-In also allows you to directly wire into laptops, consoles and handhelds.

Disclosure: Meta provided lodging for one Road to VR reporter to attend Meta Connect 2026 where information for this article was gathered.

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Today at Meta’s annual Connect developer conference the company unveiled its next-gen mixed reality headset: Meta VR Glasses. Coming alongside it early next year is an update to everyone’s favorite block-slashing rhythm game that flips the script for hand-tracking-centric input.

Beat Saber (2019) is getting an update in Spring 2027 on Meta VR Glasses and Meta Quest that finally brings hands-tracking to the game, albeit in an slightly unexpected way.

Called ‘Flux’, the update essentially reimagines the block-slashing action in a new single-player experience that uses your hands as weapons.

Check in out in action in the video below:

I had an opportunity to go hands-on with Flux in my demo with Meta VR Glasses, letting me play a single song.

Instead of slicking with, well sabers, you wield what Meta calls ‘Flux Powers’, electricity-imbued moves like the ‘Flux Tether’, which channels power between your palms to slice through rod-style notes in time with the beat of its regular slate of pulse-pounding tracks.

You also get punch through note, colored blue, red, or a light purple, the latter of which indicates you need to put both hands together. Destroying notes builds Jolt energy, which essentially gives you an extra score boost. As an OG Beat Saber fan, I immediately clicked into the new control scheme, handily scoring an ‘S’ class on what was probably the easiest setting.

Notably, Flux will also support Touch controllers too when it arrives early next year on Meta VR Glasses and Quest, coming along with 35 songs from the Original Soundtracks, Extras, and Anniversary packs, including tracks from Lindsey Sterling, Teminite, DragonForce, Haywyre, Camellia, Boom Kitty, Jaroslav Beck and Zakka G. Meta says more Flux songs are planned post-launch.

When it arrives, ostensibly alongside Meta VR Glasses next year, there’s also set to be what the company is calling an “enhanced Campaign mode,” which is set to include a “light narrative element” into the experience. The update is also coming with new barriers, missions, in-game rewards, and a new menu system that’s said to more quickly get you into game modes and new content.

Disclosure: Meta provided lodging for one Road to VR reporter to attend Meta Connect 2026 where information for this article was gathered.

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Meta Ray-Ban Display has been a US-only device since launch last year, but now the company announced at Connect 2026 that it’s coming to international markets starting today.

Meta Ray-Ban Display is a pair of $800 smart glasses that comes with a single waveguide display in the right eye and an EMG-powered ‘Neural’ wristband for some pretty amazing (and lowkey) UI control.

It’s only ever been available in the US, and only direct from brick-and-mortar retailers, as the company pushed users to go through a physical fitting process to determine which size-based SKU is right for your individual head.

Now, Meta says its finally expanding outside of the US for the first time, coming to Canada, the UK, France, Italy and Germany. Also for the first time, you’ll actually be able to buy online too.

Online ordering is coming to the US, Canada and the UK today, which start at £749 and CA$1,149, respectively. Meta is also launching online pre-orders today in France, Italy, and Germany, starting at €899, ahead of availability on October 13th. You can find out how to order on meta.com.

Prescription lenses will also be available through meta.com in the US and Canada, with select retail locations in the UK, France, and Italy supporting prescription add-ons.

What’s more, Meta says it’s expanding navigation and transit maps for Ray-Ban Display in addition to expanding dev support so users can try experiences developed by the community. There’s no specific timing on when that’s supposed to come.

Among the biggest updates though is its Hologram calling function, which uses a short self capture in the Meta AI mobile app to create a photorealistic digital avatar so you can do face-to-digital-face calls from Meta Ray-Ban Display.

Because Ray-Ban Display doesn’t include eye or facial tracking of any sort, Holograms are driven entirely by your voice, as Meta says the hologram model infers your expression from what you’re saying and how you’re saying it. Hologram are slated to start rolling out in Early Access on WhatsApp to Meta Ray-Ban Display users in the US later this fall. Check out our hands-on with Hologram avatars here.

The post Meta Ray-Ban Display is Finally Rolling Out Internationally Starting Today appeared first on Road to VR.

The franchise’s ambitions are bigger than ever in Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades 2 launches on November 12 for Quest 3 with pre-orders now open at a ten percent discount. The PC VR version will follow in the second half of 2027.

Developer Anton Hand made the announcement in a new video on his YouTube channel with an updated trailer:

We first heard about Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades 2 (H3VR2), the sequel to the award-winning VR sandbox FPS, during the Creature Feature & Friends Showcase in May, with plans for a PC VR and Quest 3 launch. Per Hand’s video, the Quest version drops this November and the Steam version will follow in the second half of 2027 with enhanced graphics, ‘comprehensive’ hardware and a dedicated framework for modding. Rust Ltd. will be assembling a testing team from its community to ensure all PC VR-compatible devices are properly verified.

H3VR2 expands on its predecessor with multiple gameplay modes to be more accessible to a wider variety of players. Its primary mode, ‘Facility’, is an extraction-style campaign where you battle enemies and loot resources in a procedurally generated megastructure. Hand said the game will run as a “pseudo-live service” with biomes planned to be added at a rate of two new ones per year. New game modes, sandbox packs, and licensed content will be sold as paid DLC.

Hot Dogs, Horseshoes & Hand Grenades 2 can be pre-ordered now for Quest 3 at a 10% discount. The Steam version can be wishlisted now ahead of its 2027 launch.

I briefly went hands-on with Snap’s Specs at the “launch” event in Los Angeles. Here’s what I thought.

If you’re unfamiliar: Snap Specs are standalone true AR glasses, meaning they have physically transparent see-through optics and can position virtual objects and interfaces in real space, while having no tether or external computing hardware. Revealed back in June, when the company opened preorders, the $2195 Specs are set to be the first fully standalone true AR glasses outside China, and the most advanced on the planet that you can actually buy, beating companies like Meta and Apple to market.

For disclosure, Snap paid for my flights and accommodation for its “launch” event, which I put in scare quotes because it didn’t actually launch the glasses. It did announce that Specs will have a built-in cross-platform agentic AI assistant, and an optional cellular case for on-the-go connectivity. CEO Evan Spiegel also demoed the glasses live on stage, a welcome respite compared to the usual prerecorded tech launches.

But while Spiegel’s demo was inarguably impressive, the problem with Specs is that, through the lenses, it simply doesn’t actually look like the casted and recorded views.

Watch Snap’s CEO Demo Specs True AR Glasses Live On Stage

Snap’s CEO demoed the soon-to-launch Specs standalone true AR glasses live on stage, including an official Harry Potter experience from HBO.

UploadVRDavid Heaney

As soon as you put on Specs, you’ll notice a number of optical artifacts. There is a rainbow pattern over the display area, which has poor color uniformity in general, as well as blue streaks from reflections of real-world light. This is not the crisp image you’ll be used to in a VR headset, nor is it even anywhere near as clear and uniform as the Meta Ray-Ban Display HUD.

The bigger problem though, as with every optically transparent AR device to ever ship, is the field of view. At 51 degrees diagonal, it’s roughly the same as HoloLens 2. What’s strange (and misleading) is that Specs renders and records a larger field of view than what it can actually display, so what you see in Snap’s promotional videos, and any recorded Specs content shared on social media, is very different to what you see in the device.

(For comparison, passthrough VR-style headsets like Quest 3 and Apple Vision Pro have a diagonal field of view of over 110°)

In practice, what you see as you look around is a rectangular slice of the virtual content that should be surrounding you. As I’ve written about many times before, this breaks object permanence, and leaves you constantly searching for where each virtual object went.

This is not a dealbreaker for all use cases. And it’s not Snap’s fault – it’s essentially impossible today to build a glasses-size transparent AR device with a field of view much larger than this. Meta’s Orion prototype famously used an exotic expensive material with no existing non-military supply chain to achieve 70 degrees, for example. But it’s something I sorely wish that companies building transparent AR devices had been more honest about for the past decade of this industry. Because the inevitable result is that people are disappointed when they put the thing on their face and see only a slice of the content.

Some experiences cleverly design around the field of view, and for others it doesn’t matter at all. This is where Specs shines. But many experiences seem to ignore it, to the detriment of usability, as if building for a future device that doesn’t yet exist.

And while it’s impressive that Specs is able to be a fully standalone device in glasses form factor, no pucks or tethers required, this feat does not come without tradeoffs. While I do describe Specs as glasses form factor, at 134 grams it sits right at the very boundary of earning that description. It is comfortable, thanks to its outwards-flexing arms (an ergonomic feature of all good recent smart glasses), but the bulk looks somewhat comical to regular bystanders. Even Spiegel admitted as much by acknowledging the memes around the form factor.

Specs also seems to render at a far lower frame rate compared to other VR devices. While Snap wouldn’t say the exact rate, rendering in many experiences felt to be nowhere near the 72FPS minimum of other XR systems. Fitting a higher-performance spatial computer into a glasses arm is simply beyond the technology of 2026.

The lack of eye tracking on Specs is also a major miss, as it quickly became tiring to raise my hand to point-and-pinch. Apple Vision Pro has established eye tracking as absolutely essential for any serious XR device interaction other than active gaming. I am convinced that Specs will be one of the last major devices in this space without eye tracking.

My description of Specs so far has been rather negative, but what I’ve really been trying to do is just establish a realistic picture of what to expect, beyond the hype and expectations that have built up around true AR glasses and Snap’s marketing. But that’s not to say that Specs isn’t a viable first-generation product for early adopters.

What’s most impressive about Specs is its computer vision tech. Even in low light when the sun went down, with dozens of people walking nearby, Specs’ positional tracking and hand tracking remained rock solid. It even features real-time continuous scene meshing with occlusion, so real-world geometry will block virtual content. To do this at such a low power envelope, in the arm of glasses, is groundbreaking. Not even Quest 3 does this!

I was also struck by how much better having 6DoF augmented reality makes key use cases I already use on Meta Ray-Ban Display feel, such as translation and navigation. It’s significantly more comfortable to have translated captions anchored to the person speaking to you rather than awkwardly on a fixed display in the lower-right of your view, and to have a huge map at chest height in front of you rather than a tiny one to the right.

Specs’ core software is also well-made, with relatively fast loading times for both interfaces and apps. While it’s not high refresh rate, it never feels sluggish. This is thanks to Snap’s years of work on a highly optimized software stack that runs from the OS to the “Lenses” (apps) built in the highly managed Lens Studio development software on PC. This is a mature well-crafted software stack, not some lazy Android fork.

Snap is also pushing Specs as a computer for virtual monitors and browser interfaces. While I can definitely see a device like Specs being a highly portable way to privately watch YouTube on a bus, train, or plane without holding up your phone, the display artifacts and limited field of view make me highly skeptical of its use for serious productivity. The coming wave of ultralight passthrough VR headsets will likely be strongly preferable for this, and even prism optic devices like Xreal Aura will offer a wider field of view and clearer image.

Snap Specs is exactly what I expected from first-generation standalone true AR glasses in 2026. It’s as if a company tried to make an iPhone in the late 90s. The idea is there, and for what tech it has to work with, Snap’s implementation of the idea is actually excellent. But the fundamental display tech is the problem. Even with well-designed software, an iPhone in 1999 just wouldn’t be the iPhone of 2007. If you’re a tech enthusiast who understands that, and can temper your expectations, Specs is like nothing else out there, and delivers an experience absolutely no other device can match. But if you’re a general consumer hoping for a highly refined consumer true AR experience, you’ll need to wait for the 2030s like everyone else.

That goes double for the game itself

Seamless