The Meta Ray-Ban Display’s most interesting tech might be the glass

iFixit has taken apart Meta’s Ray-Ban Display glasses, revealing that the technology inside isn’t what makes them special, it’s how the glass is made. iFixit explains that the glass lenses use a reflective geometric waveguide system that bounces some light back to the wearer’s eyes at specific angles via partially reflective mirrors, helping to prevent other people from getting a glimpse of the screen when they look at you.

This works with the micro-projector in the right arm, a liquid crystal-on-silicon (LCoS) device that bounces light from three LEDs to provide a 600 × 600 pixel grid image. Geometric waveguide lenses differ from older “diffractive” systems used in other AR glasses, which bend and split light instead, sometimes causing the user to see small rainbow artifacts or flash “eye glow” light in viewers. The downside is that the glass used in the Ray-Ban lens is expensive to manufacture, with iFixit speculating that Meta could sell the glasses at a loss.

iFixit had to split the arms and frame in half to do the disassembly, noting that Meta didn’t provide a way to put them back together for situations like battery replacement. “Any repair here will require specialized skills and tools,” iFixit teardown technician Shahram Mokhtari said in the video, adding that it’s “very clear that the first iterations of these smart glasses will be beyond repair.”