There’s a piece of news the major XR magazines didn’t report last week, and I think it’s quite relevant to our space: Rokid has launched its new pair of smartglasses in China, built in collaboration with eyewear brand Bolon.
Rokid X Bolon
Rokid is one of the leading manufacturers of AR glasses and smart glasses. It is based in Hangzhou, China, and it is basically the main competitor of XREAL. I’ve heard that Rokid may have an edge on the sales of AR glasses in China, while XREAL is more well-known abroad, but I’ve never personally verified these claims.
Bolon is a Chinese eyewear manufacturer based in Shanghai. It is part of the EssilorLuxottica group, like many eyewear brands worldwide.
Rokid launched last week a pair of smartglasses built in collaboration with Bolon. This partnership reminds us a lot of what Meta is doing with Ray-Ban in the Western world: Rokid puts the technology, and Bolon the design.
A photo of the launch event of the smartglasses built by Rokid together with Bolon (Image by Rokid)
The Rokid Bolon AI glasses
The Bolon Ai glasses are very reminiscent of the functionalities of Ray-Ban Meta: they have no display, but you can still use them to take photos, shoot videos, play music, make calls, and use AI as an assistant on the world around you.
They include a physical control button and a touchpad on the right temple. The chipset inside is the Qualcomm AR1. At 38.5g, they are very lightweight: they are below the 40g threshold that Mentra claims to be the maximum weight to allow for all-day usability.
Some details about the camera of the glasses (Image by Rokid)
The glasses use a 12MP camera from Sony, and the claimed battery life for mixed use is around 12h (battery duration is much shorter for heavy use instead). The glasses are compatible with various AI providers, among which the most famous is, of course, Deepseek.
Interestingly, Rokid followed the opposite route than Meta: the Rokid smartglasses I was able to try at CES 2025, and when I visited the company in Hangzhou, had a monochrome green display. Now they are launching the display-less version. Meta started without the display and has now created some hype with its new glasses with a display.
One of the promotional images of the Rokid Bolon glasses. You can see how they are trying to frame them as a stylish device (Image by Rokid)
Exactly like Ray-Ban Meta, these glasses are mainly sold as sunglasses, and you can substitute the lenses with your prescriptions if you need them. And exactly like with Ray-Ban, Bolon is here to make sure that the smartglasses are stylish and that you can be proud to wear them on the street.
The Rokid Bolon AI glasses come in different versions priced at CNY2,199 and CNY2,599 (USD310 and USD366). They are currently available only in China. The company did not comment when I asked for a possible worldwide release.
Hands-on Bolon AI glasses
I was invited to the launch event in China, but Hangzhou is not exactly close to my home, so I had to kindly decline. But my friends Nikk Mitchell (from FXG) and DannieVR were there and were so kind to give me their first-hand impressions.
Nikk Mitchell wearing the Rokid Bolon Ai glasses. He looks pretty cool (Image by Nikk Mitchell)
Nikk reported that the glasses were super light on his head, and he was also satisfied with the speakers and the camera.
DannieVR wearing the Rokid Bolon glasses shades (Image by DannieVR)
Dannie agreed that they feel “incredibly light”. She also spoke with other people at the event, and everyone had the same sensation. It seems that Rokid nailed the weight with this device. She also finds them very stylish, in a way that aligns with the Chinese aesthetics.
The original Rokid Glasses are going well
According to the magazine YiCai, “Rokid has delivered more than 200,000 of its Rokid Glasses with a display since launching pre-orders on Sept. 1, including shipping around 50,000 overseas, far exceeding its original plan to deliver between 100,000 and 150,000 units a year.”. These are not the millions of devices sold by Meta, but it is still an encouraging result for a device that came later to the market.
Dannie told me that the original Rokid Glasses also got some upgraded functionalities and are now better integrated with Alipay, so that you can pay with the glasses; NetEase Cloud Music (the Chinese equivalent of Spotify), so that you can play songs and see the lyrics on the glasses; and JD.com (one of the Chinese counterparts of Amazon), so that you can look at a piece of clothing and the glasses give you the options on how to buy it. I wonder if some of these features will make it to the new display-less Bolon Ai glasses.
The integration with Alipay can be a big deal in China (Image by Rokid)
Rokid also produces AR glasses and is interested in increasing its developer community. That’s why they are increasing the budget for developer contests for the next year to CNY10 million (USD1.4 million).
Why is all of this relevant?
I think this piece of news is worth reporting for a few reasons. First of all, it is always relevant to know what is happening in China, since it is a huge market. This becomes even more important when the news concerns an important company that is actually also selling its products in the West, like Rokid. The problem is that news from the Far East does not always go through and arrive here.
Another photo from the launch event (Image by Rokid)
The Rokid X Bolon partnership also confirms the trend of technology providers partnering with eyewear brands to sell smartglasses. The partnership of Meta with Ray-Ban proved that this is a winning choice for two reasons:
- People want to wear fashionable gadgets on the face, and technological companies can not build fashionable things alone (maybe except for Apple)
- Eyewear companies already have distribution channels through which to reach the mainstream audience. People can go to a mall and enter a shop to buy sunglasses and come out with smart glasses. This could never happen if glasses were only sold through the tech companies’ websites.
We already saw Google trying a similar route with its recent partnership with Gentle Monster. Now Rokid with Bolon proves this trend has also arrived overseas.
It is also relevant to notice that Bolon is part of the EssilorLuxottica group. Probably Rokid could partner with it because Meta can’t sell its devices in China, so maybe Luxottica’s exclusivity with Meta does not apply to the Red Country. I wonder if these glasses may ever be released worldwide.
Rokid claimed good sales numbers for its display glasses, and it is interesting to follow the sales numbers of this new model. Remember that in China, consumer VR has never taken foot, there has never been a “Quest moment” there. So I’m curious to see if there will instead be a “Ray-Ban Meta” moment: this would prove that fashionable smartglasses are appreciated worldwide.
DannieVR trying the Rokid Bolon glasses without the shades. They still look pretty good (Image by DannieVR)
The last interesting thing to me is Dannie’s reference to Chinese aesthetics. Every geographical region has its own style: what is perceived as cool here may look weird in China and vice versa. Going back and forth every year, I have come to accept that there is no “one style fits all”. So it’s important for technological companies to partner with brands that can deliver the proper style in different parts of the world. Since Gentle Monster is Korean, maybe Google’s partnership may give it an edge in the eastern part of the world against Meta.
I hope you enjoyed this piece of news. I want to thank Nikk and Dannie for helping me write this article! And if this is the first place where you’ve read this news, consider sharing it around (in groups, forums, social media posts) to also let your peers know!
[Disclaimer: Nikk Mitchell’s FXG currently has a sponsored insertion in my weekly newsletter. This is totally unrelated to his support in the writing of this article.]
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This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://skarredghost.com/2025/11/18/rokid-bolon-ai-glasses/