Smart Glasses Finally Make Sense… and Why the Middle East Is Poised to Lead the Retail Revolution

The Billion-Dollar Mood Shift

You might remember us reminiscing about the 2011 Google Glass x DVF collaboration in an article a few months ago. Turns out, we had jumped the gun with that nostalgic moment because in a mere couple of months, smart glasses are back in a major way. 

We are, of course, talking about the two blockbuster deals that reignited the smart glasses market this summer. Google invested $100 million for a 4% stake in Korean fashion-forward eyewear brand Gentle Monster, while Meta acquired a stake worth c.$3.5 billion (about 3%) in EssilorLuxottica, the parent company of Ray-Ban and Oakley. Google also announced partnerships with Warby Parker, Kering Eyewear, and others. Needless to remind you, our gentle reader, that we currently find ourselves in the eye of the AI storm, which has reignited the whole fashiontech industry vertical. 

The State of Tech
It finally seems that both the eyewear brands and tech giants have woken up to the fact that, as Marc Bain has so aptly put it in his recent article for The Business of Fashion, they have been “laser-focused on the underlying technology at the expense of style”. These recent deals give us a glimmer of hope that we will not have to sacrifice the aesthetic if we want to be tech-forward. Surely, we are not the only ones who still flinch at the memory of people wearing the clunky Apple Vision Pros on the NY subway?! This is not a dig at Apple, but rather a reminder of how hard these two categories are to combine. 

And while the retail opportunity of smart glasses should not be understated, we cannot help but get excited about some of the other use cases of smart glasses, especially in physical retail and especially in the Middle Eastern market…bear with us.

1. Design has caught up to tech
No more awkward forehead bands and glassy stares. Today’s frames look like real sunglasses, not sci-fi cosplay. Oakley’s president Caio Amato even called the brand “a technology company wrapped in art,” in his recent interview to Vogue Business, and has even teased two new drops before the end of the year.

2. The hardware finally disappears
Wave-guide displays are now slimmer than a credit card. Sub-50g frames are becoming standard. OPPO’s Air Glass 3 weighs just 50g and still delivers 1,000 nits of brightness and full AI voice support.

3. There’s actual consumer demand
Meta’s Ray-Ban Gen-2 glasses, launched in late 2023, have already sold over 2 million units, and the company plans to scale to 10 million per year by 2026. These glasses offer hands-free photo capture, Instagram livestreaming, and voice-activated AI tools like language translation, landmark recognition, and navigation.

It’s still rare to spot someone wearing smart glasses on the street, but unlike Google Glass, you no longer feel secondhand embarrassment when you do.

Cluely: A Glimpse Into In-Lens AI

When we heard about Cluely and their brilliant “cheat on everything” marketing a few months ago, we immediately thought of how transformative this could be when used with smart glasses in the context of physical retail. Let’s be honest, physical retail has been largely neglected when it comes to meaningful tech innovation. 

Cluely’s AI-powered assistant, which overlays answers and prompts across your screen in real time, can take smart glasses far beyond recording content and taking phone calls.

It’s easy to imagine a version of Cluely powering in-lens prompts:

• A sales associate wearing Cluely powered smart glasses sees a customer’s favourite brands and sizes

• A VIP shopper receives whisper translations from English into their native language mid-conversation

• A product specialist gets real-time recommendations or stock alerts as they walk the store

Backed by Andreessen Horowitz with a $15 million raise, Cluely is built on ultra-fast, low-latency architecture that’s already optimised for wearables. If it becomes the “App Store layer” for smart glasses, the UX leap will be seismic.

The Smart Glasses Playbook for Retail

The real promise of smart glasses lies in how they transform physical retail and make in-person shopping richer, more intuitive, and more seamless.

How smart glasses transform the retail journey

Take the discovery phase. Imagine walking past a store window and having your glasses instantly recognise an outfit on a mannequin, overlaying its price, size availability, and a “buy now” option in your field of view. It’s the window-shopping equivalent of tapping on a tagged Instagram post… but in real life. Foot traffic becomes instantly shoppable.

Inside the store, smart glasses enhance the try-on experience. Instead of waiting for a changing room or guessing whether a size will work, virtual try-ons can layer full-scale garments over your body in 3D as you browse. This builds confidence and reduces returns, already a major benefit in AR pilots by platforms like Shopify, which reported up to a 40% drop in returns.

For retailers who prioritise clienteling and personalised service, glasses can deliver instant, in-lens information to staff: loyalty tier, wish-list items, purchase history. This would allow teams to deliver concierge-level service without breaking eye contact or fumbling with devices.

Retail staff can use smart glasses to access real-time inventory data, locate items in the store or warehouse, and check stock availability, streamlining operations and improving customer service efficiency.

Even checkout could potentially benefit. Imagine voice-activated payments and hands-free loyalty redemption, the transaction process can be simplified, shortening queues, and making checkout feel frictionless.

Post-purchase, smart glasses can trigger in-home care tips, styling suggestions, or repurchase prompts when a customer glances at their item. It extends brand engagement beyond the physical store and into everyday life.

Smart glasses have the potential to turn the retail journey into an always-on, contextual, and deeply personal experience. 

Why the Middle East Is Ready

All of this is of course global but the Middle East, in particular, may be uniquely primed for smart glasses adoption.

Physical retail is dominant. While e-commerce continues to grow, shopping in the Gulf remains a lifestyle and cultural cornerstone. Malls like Dubai Mall, Mall of the Emirates, and Riyadh’s BLVD City aren’t just stores, they are social hubs. Smart glasses enhance this environment without replacing it.

Mobile adoption is near-universal. With 97% smartphone penetration in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, consumers are already comfortable with digital companions, smart glasses are a natural extension. Smart glasses revenue in the Middle East and Africa reached $119.7 million in 2024, with a projected 27% CAGR through 2031.

Luxury is deeply embedded. From personal shopping to clienteling and VIP lounges, the region’s luxury sector is service-driven and highly personalised. AI-powered eyewear can elevate these experiences with real-time insights.

Smart cities are being built. Dubai ranks 4th globally in the IMD Smart City Index and has launched an AI-powered mobility plan aiming to reduce commute times by 30% by 2030. Wearables that assist with navigation, translation, and contextual information fit directly into this blueprint.

The Regulatory Catch

There is one not-so-small thing though. To succeed in the GCC region, smart glasses will also have to meet strict privacy laws. Both the UAE’s Federal Data Protection Law (No. 45 of 2021) and Saudi Arabia’s PDPL (fully enforced from September 2024) restrict unconsented recording and cross-border data flows.

To stay compliant, hardware and software vendors alike will need:

• Visible recording indicators (e.g., LED light)

• Enterprise-grade opt-in settings

• Local data processing via telco-owned edge infrastructure (like Etisalat or stc)

Vendors like Meta, Google, and Cluely will need region-specific adaptations to operate compliantly, and that’s a competitive edge for those who move fast.

If we had a crystal ball…

If we were to guess how this innovation will pan out over the next 18-24 months, and please keep in mind this is our wishful thinking only, we would expect key players like Majid Al Futtaim or Emaar to debut “AR retail lanes” in their malls, working with brands to ensure data compatibilty, with luxury brands adopting smart glasses for their staff. Companies like Cluely and Perplexity will race to become the iOS of smart eyewear. And finally, with the rumours of a potential Apple Glass launch in 2026, we might see smartglasses with native payments and app support (so that Apple has a chance to recover its place in this AI race…after it hopefully retires Siri already 🙄). 

Fashion and tech finally seem to be building on the same team, the consumer is primed, the GCC region provides a fertile ground for innovation adoption… and so we wait! Bring popcorn, this will be fun.