THE LATEST NEWS ON
APPLE’S AR GLASSES
Various rumors, sometimes contradicting
each other, about Apple’s supposed AR
headwear project have come and gone
over the years. However, the latest reports
point towards Apple bringing out at least
one AR headset at some stage next year. In
October, Kuo predicted a whole round of AR
headsets made in collaboration with “third-
party brands”. It’s possible that Valve is one of
those brands – especially given that its first
VR headset, the Valve Index, was released in
April 2019.
That gives Valve a certain amount of expertise
in a hardware market where Apple may have
faced some unexpected stumbles. In June,
DigiTimes claimed that Apple had suspended
development on AR and VR headsets, and
the news outlet has since elaborated that this
was a case of Apple transitioning from in-
house development to a more collaborative
approach. Notably, Valve helped Apple to
update macOS with native VR headset support
back in 2017.
There has long been a question mark over
whether the AR headwear would resemble
streamlined spectacles along the lines of
Google Glass or a more conspicuous, helmet-
like headset similar to the Microsoft HoloLens.
However, the former is currently looking likelier,
as DigiTimes reports that the eyewear will be
tethered to an iPhone and “synchronize with a
wearer’s smartphone to display things such as
texts, emails, maps and games over the user’s
field of vision.”