After finding success in smartphones and, more recently, electric vehicles, Chinese tech firm Xiaomi has launched AI-powered smart glasses to once again compete in a crowded market dominated by large, established players.

At the same “Human x Car x Home” event Xiaomi also began pre-orders for its upcoming YU7 electric SUV, which it later said racked up some 200,000 sales in the space of three minutes.

The company described its glasses as a “next-generation personal smart gadget” and said they would capture video and respond to voice commands using the company’s XiaoAI assistant.

Voice commands

The features are similar to those offered by Meta’s market-leading Ray-Ban-branded smart glasses, which accounted for more than 60 percent of AI glasses sales worldwide last year, according to Counterpoint figures.

Xiaomi’s glasses are to be priced starting at 1,999 yuan ($279, £203) with a 12 megapixel ultra-wide camera and Qualcomm’s AR1 chip.

The glasses’ battery should last 8.6 hours on a single charge, double that of Meta’s device, and takes 45 minutes to fully recharge, Xiaomi said.

Users can use voice commands to take photos, record video clips, use AI to identify objects or translate text the user is looking at in a book, as well as using the built-in camera to scan mobile QR codes to make payments, Xiaomi said.

At the event Xiaomi also launched a new compact foldable phone, the Mix Flip 2, a 12.5-inch Pad 7S Pro with an XRING O1 3nm chip, a tenth generation smart band and a small-sized Watch S4.

The company also introduced new home appliances including a combination vacuum cleaner and mopping robot, a floor scrubber, an air conditioner and a hair dryer.

Xiaomi previously backed Superhexa, which last year released AI-powered audio glasses called Jiehuan.

Smart glasses ‘war’

Counterpoint said in a February report that it expected a “war of hundreds of smart glasses” this year as competitors tried to capitalise on the success of Meta’s Ray-Ban devices.

Huawei in April launched an updated version of its smart glasses with simultaneous translation and other AI-powered features.

Huawei’s Eyewear 2 Titanium has titanium temples and either round or squared frames, along with new features including voice commands and gesture controls as well as simultaneous translation.

The Huawei glasses do not include a camera, however.