XREAL Aura brings Android XR and Gemini to your eyes, but it'll cost you

Imagine sitting on a plane, opening your laptop, and having a massive virtual display in front of you without carrying a monitor. That’s exactly the experience XREAL promises with its latest pair of XR glasses.

Unveiled at Google’s Android Developer Summit, the XREAL Aura has been developed in collaboration with Google and Qualcomm. It runs Android XR, bringing Gemini, your favorite Android apps, and immersive experiences into a relatively lightweight pair of glasses. And unlike conventional VR headsets that block out your surroundings, the Aura lets you interact with digital content while still seeing what’s happening in the real world.

Your next workspace might be right in front of your eyes

The XREAL Aura does much more than mirror your phone or laptop screen. Because it runs Android XR, you can open Android apps directly on the glasses, arrange multiple windows in your field of view, and interact with digital content without connecting a computer.

Of course, you can still connect a laptop if you want to. Using a compatible USB-C cable, you can mirror your computer’s display onto a large virtual screen, resize it, and position it alongside your Android XR apps. You don’t need to install any additional software.

Think about how often you switch between browser tabs, documents, and messaging apps when working on a laptop. With the Aura, you can keep your laptop display in front of you while opening other Android apps around it. It’s an interesting alternative to carrying a portable monitor, especially if you travel often. And since the windows exist in virtual space, you don’t need an actual desk large enough to accommodate them.

But perhaps the biggest difference is that you can do all this without losing sight of your surroundings. The Aura uses transparent optical lenses rather than completely enclosing your eyes. So, even with several windows open, you can still see your keyboard, reach for your coffee, or notice someone trying to get your attention.

The hardware is quite interesting, too. XREAL has equipped the glasses with Sony Micro-OLED displays offering 1200p resolution per eye, a 120Hz refresh rate, and a 70-degree field of view. That wider viewing area should give you more room to work with virtual windows, although we’ll have to see how comfortable reading smaller text feels in practice.

You also get Bose-tuned audio and electrochromic dimming, which lets you darken the lenses when you want fewer distractions. That could come in handy when you’re watching a movie and don’t particularly want your living room competing for your attention.

Despite all this hardware, the glasses weigh less than 95 grams. XREAL has achieved this by moving the battery and much of the processing hardware into a separate compute puck, powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Reality Elite platform. The glasses themselves also feature XREAL’s X1S chip to handle spatial display processing.

That lightweight design comes with a compromise, though. Because the Aura uses a wired connection to the puck, you carry an extra device instead of wearing a fully self-contained pair of smart glasses. On the plus side, the puck doubles as a trackpad, and you can also navigate the interface using hand gestures, voice commands, or compatible keyboards and controllers.

Gemini, on the other hand, could make the Aura useful for more than just putting giant screens in front of your eyes. It can understand what you’re looking at, including content on a mirrored laptop display. You can also share your view with Gemini and have it highlight relevant things in your surroundings or on screen.

Say you’re trying to follow instructions to fix something around the house. Instead of repeatedly checking your phone to figure out which part or setting the instructions refer to, you could ask Gemini for help and have it point out what you should be looking at.

There’s plenty to play with, if you can pay for it

As useful as a portable workstation sounds, not everyone wants to spend their time wearing glasses just to get more work done. Fortunately, XREAL also puts plenty of emphasis on entertainment.

Since the Aura runs Android XR, you’ll have access to millions of familiar apps and games through Google Play, along with more than 150 experiences designed specifically for XR. That means you aren’t limited to watching regular Android apps on floating screens. Some experiences use the physical space around you.

Take the NBA app, for example. With an NBA League Pass subscription, you can watch up to three games at once, which sounds like a great setup for anyone who struggles to choose which matchup to follow. The Court View feature also lets you experience live basketball in a miniature, tabletop-style presentation.

Gaming is another area where things get interesting. Fallout: Factions brings miniature battles to a virtual tabletop, while Project Hail Mary: Journey Among the Stars takes you on an interactive sci-fi adventure. Cubism, a puzzle game that lets you arrange colorful 3D blocks in your surroundings, is also on the list, alongside titles like Oh My Galaxy! and Chess Club.

And if you’d rather stick to your existing games, you can connect a compatible handheld gaming console over USB-C and play on a much larger virtual display. It’s easy to see the appeal of turning a handheld’s relatively small screen into something closer to a personal gaming theater, especially on the go.

XREAL has also announced a wireless keyboard and a gaming controller developed with GameSir. Interestingly, the controller includes a dedicated Gemini button, making it easier to access Google’s assistant while playing.

There’s plenty beyond gaming, too. Google Photos gets a spatial gallery that lets you browse your memories in a virtual environment and view supported photos in 3D. XREAL is also bringing immersive entertainment experiences to the platform, including Nevatars, Galapagos, and The Nutcracker.

Of course, all these possibilities come at a fairly steep price. The XREAL Aura starts at $1,279 for the 12GB RAM and 256GB storage model, but it’s available for $1,099 through December as part of a limited-time offer. The 16GB RAM and 512GB storage variant costs $1,499, with a promotional price of $1,299.

The glasses are available to order in the US, Canada, and South Korea, including through Best Buy in the US. Orders open in Japan on November 2, while shipments are expected to begin in mid-November. Wider retail availability, including select Google Store locations, is planned for 2027.

At over $1,000, the Aura certainly isn’t something most people will buy on a whim. There’s also the question of whether wearing glasses connected to a puck will feel convenient enough for extended use. But what makes the Aura exciting isn’t the promise of bigger virtual screens; it’s the possibility of having your familiar Android apps, games, and even an AI assistant work together in the space around you. If XREAL can make that experience feel as natural as it sounds, these glasses could offer a compelling reason to try Android XR.