Snap is back with a new pair of AR smart glasses, and for the first time in years, it’s ready to sell them to consumers.
The company plans to sell these new glasses, called Specs, to consumers starting in 2026, CEO Evan Spiegel announced on Tuesday during the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, California. A Snap spokesperson tells TechCrunch the glasses will ship in 2026, as well.
Snap’s Specs will feature many of the same augmented reality and artificial intelligence capabilities that are available on the company’s developer-facing smart glasses, the Spectacles 5. However, the company says the Specs will be smaller and lighter — ideally making them more innocuous to wear in public than their extremely large predecessors.
The Specs will feature see-through lenses capable of displaying graphics to users as if they were projected on the world in front of them. The glasses will also feature an AI assistant powered by Snap’s technology, capable of processing both audio and video.
The Specs announcement comes nearly a decade after Snap first attempted to sell consumer smart glasses with the initial launch of Spectacles in 2016 — a product that ended up selling poorly. While Snap was ahead of its time then, the company now faces fierce competition in the AR glasses market from giants like Meta and Google that have recently unveiled AR products of their own.
Meta reportedly plans to unveil glasses with a built-in screen, codenamed “Hypernova,” later in 2025. Meanwhile, Google recently announced partnerships with Warby Parker, Samsung, and other companies to develop its Android XR smart glasses.
Snap is hoping its SnapOS developer ecosystem — which the company has spent the last several years building out — will give it an edge in the AR race. Many of the millions of AR experiences developers have built for Snapchat and Spectacles, called Lenses, will also work on the new Specs, the company said.
Onstage, Spiegel showcased a few of these lenses. One of them, “Super Travel,” will translate signs and menus for users in foreign countries. Another app Spiegel showcased, “Cookmate,” finds recipes based on available ingredients in a user’s kitchen, and then offers step-by-step cooking guidance.
Companies have been demoing these use cases in AR for years, but have struggled to deliver a pair of smart glasses that are capable, affordable, and comfortable enough to give everyday consumers a taste of AR. Snap seems to believe it’s done just that with Specs, but several details are still unclear.
Snap did not reveal on Tuesday how much the Specs will cost, how it plans to sell the glasses, or what exactly they’ll look like.
Snap also announced several developer updates to beef up its SnapOS platform. Developers can now build apps powered by multimodal AI models from OpenAI and Google DeepMind. To enable more AI apps, the company announced a “Depth Module API” that will anchor AR graphics from large language models in three-dimensional space.
In the future, Snap says it will be partnering with Niantic Spatial, the company that spun off from the creator of Pokémon Go, to build AI-powered maps of the world.
Whether all of these efforts will translate into a pair of smart glasses that consumers will truly want to buy remains to be seen. While Meta has found early success with Ray-Ban Meta, it seems likely that Snap’s Specs will be significantly more expensive. To get consumers on board, Snap may have to turn AR glasses from something novel into a practical device.
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![Believe It: ‘Naruto’ Gets In On the Anime Trading Card Game Craze
The Naruto anime turns 25 next year, and to mark the occasion, it’s getting a new trading card game. Developed by Bandai Card Games, the TCG will be a strategy-focused experience for the competitive-minded folk. Along with the big anniversary milestone, this’ll be the franchise’s first dip into the trading card waters since the early 2010s. Since then, Bandai’s been gradually putting out similar games for popular shonen like Digimon, One Piece, and Dragon Ball. As a member of the Big Three and important to shonen culture, it makes sense Naruto gets a fresh game. In a brief statement, Naruto creator Masashi Kishimoto expressed joy at his franchise “growing larger once again. I truly hope these cards find their way to both their hands and your hearts.” Kishimoto also drew artwork for the TCG featuring the teen versions of Boruto’s dad and his longtime best bud Sasuke Uchiha, and they’re the stars of the trailer below. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MefaL2fKvzk[/embed] Bandai’s keeping mum for now on how Naruto Card Game plays or even what characters will be in it. Details will be revealed at Gen Con Indy, where attendees will also get to play it for themselves. The annual tabletop game convention runs from July 30-August 2 this year, and playtests will run during the whole event. Each one-hour session is free, and you can get tickets here. If you can’t make it, then you’ll surely see more of it before the TCG hits stores in 2027. It’s probably not the only thing being cooked up to honor the anime—after all, Pierrot never did release those four brand-new episodes to celebrate the 20th anniversary. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who. #Naruto #Anime #Trading #Card #Game #CrazeBandai,Naruto,Trading Cards](https://i1.wp.com/gizmodo.com/app/uploads/2026/06/naruto-tcg-hed-1280x853.jpg?ssl=1 "Believe It: ‘Naruto’ Gets In On the Anime Trading Card Game Craze
The Naruto anime turns 25 next year, and to mark the occasion, it’s getting a new trading card game. Developed by Bandai Card Games, the TCG will be a strategy-focused experience for the competitive-minded folk. Along with the big anniversary milestone, this’ll be the franchise’s first dip into the trading card waters since the early 2010s. Since then, Bandai’s been gradually putting out similar games for popular shonen like Digimon, One Piece, and Dragon Ball. As a member of the Big Three and important to shonen culture, it makes sense Naruto gets a fresh game. In a brief statement, Naruto creator Masashi Kishimoto expressed joy at his franchise “growing larger once again. I truly hope these cards find their way to both their hands and your hearts.” Kishimoto also drew artwork for the TCG featuring the teen versions of Boruto’s dad and his longtime best bud Sasuke Uchiha, and they’re the stars of the trailer below. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MefaL2fKvzk[/embed] Bandai’s keeping mum for now on how Naruto Card Game plays or even what characters will be in it. Details will be revealed at Gen Con Indy, where attendees will also get to play it for themselves. The annual tabletop game convention runs from July 30-August 2 this year, and playtests will run during the whole event. Each one-hour session is free, and you can get tickets here. If you can’t make it, then you’ll surely see more of it before the TCG hits stores in 2027. It’s probably not the only thing being cooked up to honor the anime—after all, Pierrot never did release those four brand-new episodes to celebrate the 20th anniversary. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who. #Naruto #Anime #Trading #Card #Game #CrazeBandai,Naruto,Trading Cards")
![Believe It: ‘Naruto’ Gets In On the Anime Trading Card Game Craze
The Naruto anime turns 25 next year, and to mark the occasion, it’s getting a new trading card game. Developed by Bandai Card Games, the TCG will be a strategy-focused experience for the competitive-minded folk. Along with the big anniversary milestone, this’ll be the franchise’s first dip into the trading card waters since the early 2010s. Since then, Bandai’s been gradually putting out similar games for popular shonen like Digimon, One Piece, and Dragon Ball. As a member of the Big Three and important to shonen culture, it makes sense Naruto gets a fresh game. In a brief statement, Naruto creator Masashi Kishimoto expressed joy at his franchise “growing larger once again. I truly hope these cards find their way to both their hands and your hearts.” Kishimoto also drew artwork for the TCG featuring the teen versions of Boruto’s dad and his longtime best bud Sasuke Uchiha, and they’re the stars of the trailer below. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MefaL2fKvzk[/embed] Bandai’s keeping mum for now on how Naruto Card Game plays or even what characters will be in it. Details will be revealed at Gen Con Indy, where attendees will also get to play it for themselves. The annual tabletop game convention runs from July 30-August 2 this year, and playtests will run during the whole event. Each one-hour session is free, and you can get tickets here. If you can’t make it, then you’ll surely see more of it before the TCG hits stores in 2027. It’s probably not the only thing being cooked up to honor the anime—after all, Pierrot never did release those four brand-new episodes to celebrate the 20th anniversary. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who. #Naruto #Anime #Trading #Card #Game #CrazeBandai,Naruto,Trading Cards](https://gizmodo.com/app/uploads/2026/06/naruto-tcg-hed-1280x853.jpg "Believe It: ‘Naruto’ Gets In On the Anime Trading Card Game Craze
The Naruto anime turns 25 next year, and to mark the occasion, it’s getting a new trading card game. Developed by Bandai Card Games, the TCG will be a strategy-focused experience for the competitive-minded folk. Along with the big anniversary milestone, this’ll be the franchise’s first dip into the trading card waters since the early 2010s. Since then, Bandai’s been gradually putting out similar games for popular shonen like Digimon, One Piece, and Dragon Ball. As a member of the Big Three and important to shonen culture, it makes sense Naruto gets a fresh game. In a brief statement, Naruto creator Masashi Kishimoto expressed joy at his franchise “growing larger once again. I truly hope these cards find their way to both their hands and your hearts.” Kishimoto also drew artwork for the TCG featuring the teen versions of Boruto’s dad and his longtime best bud Sasuke Uchiha, and they’re the stars of the trailer below. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MefaL2fKvzk[/embed] Bandai’s keeping mum for now on how Naruto Card Game plays or even what characters will be in it. Details will be revealed at Gen Con Indy, where attendees will also get to play it for themselves. The annual tabletop game convention runs from July 30-August 2 this year, and playtests will run during the whole event. Each one-hour session is free, and you can get tickets here. If you can’t make it, then you’ll surely see more of it before the TCG hits stores in 2027. It’s probably not the only thing being cooked up to honor the anime—after all, Pierrot never did release those four brand-new episodes to celebrate the 20th anniversary. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who. #Naruto #Anime #Trading #Card #Game #CrazeBandai,Naruto,Trading Cards")
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