{"id":306424,"date":"2026-02-19T16:35:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T16:35:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/306424\/"},"modified":"2026-02-19T16:35:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T16:35:07","slug":"meta-looks-to-take-on-apple-with-first-smartwatch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/306424\/","title":{"rendered":"Meta Looks to Take on Apple With First Smartwatch"},"content":{"rendered":"

Meta<\/a>\u00a0has reportedly resurrected its smartwatch project, aiming to release the device this year.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s according to a\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0Wednesday (Feb. 19) from The Information, which notes that the company\u2019s efforts are happening as its Big Tech peers like\u00a0Apple<\/a>,\u00a0Google<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0OpenAI<\/a>\u00a0are also planning new\u00a0consumer device<\/a>\u00a0launches.<\/p>\n

The report, citing sources familiar with the matter, says Meta has relaunched its shelved smartwatch project, planning to unveil it later in 2026 with health-tracking features and the company\u2019s artificial intelligence system built in.<\/p>\n

Meta had\u00a0mothballed the smartwatch project<\/a>\u00a0in 2022 as it scaled back spending on its Reality Labs division. But sources told The Information the company decided to resume its work following a strategy meeting in 2025 at CEO Mark Zuckerberg\u2019s home in Hawaii.<\/p>\n

\"Preferred<\/p>\n

We\u2019d love to be your preferred source for news<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Please add us to your preferred sources list so our news, data and interviews show up in your feed. Thanks!<\/p>\n

According to The Information, Meta is planning to debut its smartwatch while also\u00a0streamlining<\/a>\u00a0its augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) projects.<\/p>\n

The company has a handful or AR and MR glasses in development, and one source said executives are concerned that introducing too many devices too quickly will cause confusion among consumers. This has led the company to rethink its timelines, the report added.<\/p>\n

Advertisement: Scroll to Continue<\/p>\n

Reality Labs employees learned in December that Meta had delayed Phoenix, its MR glasses, until 2027. As for 2026, Meta plans to introduce a new version of the Meta Ray-Ban Display, one of the sources said. The first version of these glasses, which have a miniature display embedded into one lens, went on sale last year for $799.<\/p>\n

In January, the company said it was pushing back\u00a0international expansion<\/a>\u00a0of the smart glasses in the U.K., France, Italy and Canada because of \u201cunprecedented demand and limited inventory.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Meta is continuing to develop consumer-facing AR glasses code-named Artemis, expected to be released next year, according to one of the sources.<\/p>\n

This week also saw a report from Bloomberg News that Apple is accelerating its work on three artificial intelligence (AI)-powered\u00a0wearable devices<\/a>: smart glasses, a pendant and AirPods. These devices will be built around the company\u2019s Siri digital assistant and linked to the iPhone. The pendant and the AirPods with expanded AI capabilities could debut as early as this year, while the smart glasses could come next year, the report said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Meta\u00a0has reportedly resurrected its smartwatch project, aiming to release the device this year. That\u2019s according to a\u00a0report\u00a0Wednesday (Feb.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":306425,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[61,60,1226,43,179,5065,80,3926,181],"class_list":["post-306424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-meta","tag-news","tag-pymnts-news","tag-smartwatches","tag-technology","tag-wearables","tag-whats-hot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306424\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}