Meta

How AI Glasses Are Empowering People With Disabilities

Takeaways

  • Our AI glasses are helping people with disabilities navigate their daily lives by enabling hands-free calling and texting, translating speech, describing their surroundings, connecting them with volunteers who can provide assistance, and more.
  • People with disabilities also use our AI glasses to create photo and video content, track their fitness training, and listen to music.
  • We partnered with the Blinded Veterans Association to create a training guide for blind and low-vision individuals that explains how to activate voice commands, read documents, and answer phone calls using our AI glasses.

We’re proud to build cutting-edge, wearable technology that empowers people with disabilities to perform daily tasks with more independence. Our AI glasses – Ray-Ban Meta, Oakley Meta Vanguard, and Meta Ray-Ban Display – allow for hands-free support so you can make phone calls, send text messages, translate speech, and capture photos and videos, all by the sound of your voice.

Meta AI can also provide detailed descriptions of your environment and our Call a Volunteer feature, created in partnership with Be My Eyes, connects blind or low-vision individuals with volunteers who can describe what you’re seeing and help you complete daily tasks.

Capturing Moments Hands-Free

Noah Currier, a Marine Corps veteran with quadriplegia and founder of Oscar Mike, a nonprofit that benefits injured and disabled veterans, said that taking voice-prompted photos and videos is “changing the game” for physically disabled and vision-impaired people.

“I’m a wheelchair user and I’m a quadriplegic, so my hands don’t work. I probably have much fewer photos and videos in my phone than anybody else in the world. Being able to take photos and videos hands-free was incredible,” he said. “The very first thing I did was take a picture of my baby when I got home, and it was awesome.”

Ray-Ban Meta glasses combine timeless style with innovative functionality. The hands-free camera and 3K Ultra HD video capture life’s most important moments, and an open-ear audio player lets you stay engaged with your surroundings.

Sparking Creativity With Meta AI

James Rath, a filmmaker and content creator who is blind, incorporates Ray-Ban Meta and Meta AI in his workflow to capture first-person perspectives in outdoor settings.

“I’ll use them as more of my eyes. I’ll ask the AI, ‘is my setting set to the right ISO, to the right aperture?’ Just [to] make sure my camera settings are what I believe and what I think I see,” he said. “When I’m filming a scene I’ll describe how I want it to look and ask the glasses if there’s anything in the background I need to remove. That saves me a lot of time in post production.”

The AI technology embedded in Meta’s glasses also helps Rath check in on his guide dog, Hoagie. Rath can get feedback from Meta AI about what Hoagie is doing, or if he’s looking for his leash or food bowl.

Learning About the World Around You

Jezz Chung, a writer and performer who has ADHD and autism, said that the technology in Ray-Ban Meta glasses can give people with disabilities more autonomy in their lives. She said that taking photos and videos from her point of view can help others learn how she experiences the world.

Chung said that Ray-Ban Meta’s AI capabilities will help her stay present in her environment whenever she’s curious about what she sees, like an animal or nature, without having to use her phone. At a moment’s notice, Chung said that she can take photos in order to find a cafe or identify a landmark, and avoid being distracted by her phone especially when she is with a friend.

Reaching Your Fitness Goals

Our AI glasses can monitor your activity, keep track of your training, and help you get the most out of your workout when connected to a Garmin device. You can ask Meta AI how you’re doing on your run or ride, or get updates on specific stats in real time, all hands- and screen-free so you can stay present while you train.

Nick Mayhugh, a Paralympic athlete with cerebral palsy, uses our AI glasses to monitor the quality of his workouts and keep track of his training. With Meta AI, he can find out how far along he is in his workouts without having to look at his phone.

Working With the Disabled Community to Empower Independence

Veterans Affairs Blind Rehabilitation Centers use Ray-Ban Meta glasses to support blind and low-vision veterans, which is why we partnered with the Blinded Veterans Association to develop a training guide for those veterans. The guide explains how to use the glasses while navigating the world with more autonomy and confidence – activating voice commands, reading documents, answering phone calls, and more. For more information about these accessibility features, please see our help article.

We’re committed to collaborating with communities to build products for diverse needs, and we’re proud that our AI technology empowers members of the disabled community to connect in ways most accessible to them.