Report: Apple wants smart glasses out by the end of 2027, and the first pair has no display
Apple wants its first smart glasses out in some form by the end of 2027, and that first pair is reported to carry audio, a camera and smart features but no display. The end-of-2027 target comes from Mark Gurman's Power On newsletter for Bloomberg, published on September 27, which also puts a revamped headset under the codename N224 at late 2028 or early 2029.
Vision Pro already moves its battery off the head into a separate pack, but not its processing.
Apple has announced no glasses and no headset revision, so this is a report about internal targets rather than a product. Bloomberg's account puts a display for video feedback in a later glasses release, not the first one.
A date Apple has not committed to is a date that can move.
The headset concept borrows an idea Meta has already priced
Bloomberg reports that four concepts are under consideration for N224, one of them moving some of the headset's internal components out into a separate part, possibly a puck. Apple already keeps Vision Pro's battery off the head in a pack on a cable, but the compute stays inside the visor.
Meta has taken the split further and put a price on it. Its 100-gram VR Glasses cost $1,299.99 and are due in spring 2027, with a wired puck that carries the processing, and that puck also takes DisplayPort in so the glasses can act as a monitor.
Meta's glasses are not out either, but on the reported timeline they would still reach buyers 18 months or more before N224.
A display-less first pair would land in the busiest part of the market
Glasses without a screen are not a fallback in 2026, they are the volume product. Counterpoint Research counted 263% growth in AI glasses shipments in the first half of 2026, with 96% of them carrying no display, which is the shape of the category Apple would be entering.
It is also where Meta is already selling, with Ray-Ban Meta Gen 3 at $449 in the US and the camera-free Ray-Ban Meta Audio at $349 from October 13, the price band a first Apple pair would have to answer.
Ming-Chi Kuo published the no-display detail last year
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who publishes his own supply-chain notes, wrote on June 29, 2025 that Apple's Ray-Ban-style glasses were scheduled for mass production in 2Q27, with projected shipments of 3 to 5 million units or more in 2027. The same note lists "No display functionality" for that product, with audio playback, camera, video recording and AI environmental sensing as its core features.
Kuo's note is 15 months old, which is long enough for a schedule to change, and the two forecasts come from different sources, neither of them Apple. No name, no price and no specification has been established for the glasses, and the only Apple headset a reader can buy remains Vision Pro.
