What Happened at Meta’s Livestream
Meta Connect 2026 kicked off from Menlo Park on September 23, opening a few minutes after its scheduled 7 PM ET start as the room filled with employees and press. When the lights dropped, the show opened on a video labeled “live demo,” showing a VR workstation. A CG avatar of Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth appeared onstage before Zuckerberg walked out in person and opened with a pitch on personal superintelligence rather than hardware.
Wang Takes Over for Muse
Within minutes, Zuckerberg handed the stage to Alexandr Wang, Meta’s Chief AI Officer, whose own Muse avatar is modeled after his dog. Wang ran through what the assistant can now do: control a computer through a new Mac app, hold its own email address, and shop directly through new deals with Shopify, PayPal, Walmart, Best Buy, and Instacart. He cited one user whose Muse-negotiated deal cut an internet bill by $85.
Zuckerberg Demos Muse’s Voice Live
Zuckerberg returned to demo Muse’s new voice mode live, talking to his own AI agent through a pair of AI glasses onstage. His agent appeared as a Roman-toga-wearing avatar named Agrippa. Meta says anyone will be able to change their Muse’s voice, accent, speed, and name going forward.
Privacy, Then a New Hearing Feature
Zuckerberg addressed privacy directly onstage, covering the glasses’ recording indicator light, new tamper protections, and a private processing mode for certain features. He then introduced Hearing Enhancement, an FDA-cleared feature built for people with hearing loss, priced as a one-time $149 add-on and arriving first on Meta Glasses.
The Glasses Lineup, One by One
A wall of glasses opened up behind Zuckerberg as the livestream shifted to hardware. He unveiled the audio-only glasses first, Meta’s first camera-free pair, with the longest battery life of any glasses the company has made. Ray-Ban Meta Gen 3 followed: slimmer Wayfarer frames, new aviator styles, Dolby Atmos audio recording, and a redesigned Clubmaster frame thin enough to need new internal components.
Meta Glasses Adventurer got a price cut to $249, and a new “Lisa” celebrity collaboration frame arrived with a pet-inspired charm. Zuckerberg also said Meta Ray-Ban Display is now expanding to more countries.
One More Pair of Glasses
Zuckerberg then said there was one more pair of glasses to show. The Meta VR Glasses drew a big cheer from the room, weighing about 100 grams, which he called far lighter than the Vision Pro. A video showed James Cameron and Palmer Luckey reacting to the device ahead of the live demos.
Onstage, Bosworth watched an immersive 3D National Geographic video, then played a hand-tracking version of Beat Saber, one of 75 titles ready at launch, saying, “VR gaming is alive and well.” Meta also showed full-body photorealistic VR holograms for calling, coming to both the VR Glasses and Ray-Ban Display glasses. A screen behind Zuckerberg summed up the pitch as a personal cinema, a computer, and a game console in one device. He claimed Meta executives have already hit over 100 words per minute typing on the glasses’ virtual keyboard.
Pricing landed at $1,299, shipping this spring, with support for the full Quest game library through controllers and Xbox Cloud Gaming.
The Closing Surprise
With the livestream already running close to an hour, Zuckerberg closed on what he called “one more thing”: Muse Charm, a keychain-sized device built for talking to your Muse agent. Meta’s own Connect blog commits to no firmer timeline than “later this year.” Onstage, Zuckerberg gave a more specific window, in time for the holidays, but said it wasn’t finalized yet. Pricing for Muse Charm has not been announced.
