XREAL has priced the Aura, its Android XR glasses. The cheaper version costs USD 1,279, or about KES 166,000. A version with more memory and storage costs USD 1,499, or about KES 194,000. Pre-orders opened on 7th October 2026.
Only people who paid a reservation deposit before that day can order one, though. XREAL says orders open to everyone else in the coming weeks.
XREAL’s other glasses, such as the USD 449 XREAL 1S, plug into a phone, laptop or games console and show its screen as a big virtual display. The Aura brings its own computer, and that’s what the extra USD 830 pays for.
The Aura comes in two parts joined by a cable. The glasses weigh less than 95 grams. The processor, battery and storage sit in a separate puck that clips to a pocket or hangs on a lanyard, and its surface doubles as a touchpad. Those are the heavy, warm parts of any headset, and moving them off your face keeps the glasses light. Meta did the same with its VR Glasses, which we covered last month.
The puck runs Android XR, Google’s version of Android for headsets and glasses. That means ordinary Android apps from Google Play, such as YouTube and Google Maps, open as windows floating in the room, up to five at a time, and you move them with your hands. Gemini, Google’s AI assistant, is built in and, with your permission, can use the glasses’ camera to answer questions about what you see.
The puck uses the Snapdragon Reality Elite, Qualcomm’s newest chip for headsets and glasses. XREAL’s own X1S chip in the glasses keeps windows pinned in place as you turn your head.
How the Aura shows you the room
With the Aura you look through the lenses at the actual room, and the picture is laid over it. XREAL calls this optical see-through. Meta’s VR Glasses have open sides and a passthrough camera, which films the room and shows it on the screens inside.
Seeing the room directly means there’s no camera delay, and people around you can still see your eyes. Room light does show through behind the picture, so the lenses dim in five steps and can block up to 99.9% of it for a film.
Two Sony micro-OLED screens, 1920 x 1200 pixels per eye, fill a 70-degree field of view, which is how much of your vision the picture covers. That’s the same as Meta’s glasses.
So if you buy one, you get a big private screen and the Android apps you already use without losing sight of the room. Plug in a laptop or games handheld and the glasses work as its monitor too.
Who gets one, and when
The Aura ships before the holidays in the US, Canada, Japan and South Korea. Reservations opened in June at USD 99 for a Launch Credit or USD 299 for one of 2,000 Founder Priority Passes. Launch Credit buyers were told in June they’d get “priority shipping access”. XREAL’s shop now guarantees launch-day shipping only to the founders, and puts Launch Credit and Priority Deposit holders in the second wave.
New buyers can pay a USD 199 Priority Deposit. It’s refundable and comes off the price, but it can’t be used until the end of October.
The UK was in XREAL’s first wave in June and has now dropped off the list. XREAL says only that more markets come in 2027.
| Market | 12GB RAM, 256GB storage | 16GB RAM, 512GB storage |
|---|---|---|
| United States | USD 1,279 (about KES 166,000) | USD 1,499 (about KES 194,000) |
| Canada | CAD 1,829 (about KES 167,000) | CAD 2,149 (about KES 196,000) |
| Japan | JPY 229,800 (about KES 188,000) | JPY 269,800 (about KES 221,000) |
| South Korea | KRW 1,990,000 (about KES 193,000) | KRW 2,290,000 (about KES 222,000) |
Both versions come in M and L at the same price, matched to the distance between your pupils: 60 to 66mm or 66 to 72mm. A frame for prescription lenses is in the box.
XREAL hasn’t given a launch date, battery life, the puck’s weight or the price of prescription lenses. The battery is 4,455mAh, but that doesn’t tell you how many films you’ll get through.
What it means for buyers
In June, XREAL promised the base model would cost no more than USD 1,500. It came in USD 221 under that. It also undercuts Meta’s VR Glasses by USD 21. Meta’s pair costs USD 1,299.99, uses the same Qualcomm chip and doesn’t go on sale until spring 2027. So the Aura gets several months in stores first, and Best Buy will carry it in the US.
XREAL pitches the Aura for watching and working on flights. For anyone thinking of paying the USD 199 deposit now, battery life is still the missing number.
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