Without AI, will movie-viewing AR glasses still have a place?

As generative AI technology gradually penetrates into terminal consumer electronics products, "lightweight AI glasses" have recently become popular in the market. For a while, "AR glasses must have AI" seems to have become an industry consensus. Under this trend, the market position of movie-viewing AR glasses that lack independent computing power and focus on "portable giant screens" is being challenged.

However, from the perspective of user demand and technological evolution, AR glasses for viewing movies will still occupy an important position in the short to medium term. According to TrendForce's "2025 Near-Eye Display Market Trends and Technology Analysis" report, global AR glasses shipments are expected to be 620,000 units in 2025; among them, movie-viewing products using Birdbath optical solutions and equipped with OLEDoS display technology have a market share of more than 50%.

The core value of AR glasses for viewing movies is to provide a high-quality, highly immersive personal viewing experience. The target users are mainly business people with limited living space and frequent travel, as well as consumer groups with higher requirements for gaming and audio-visual experience. The core requirements are wide-angle resolution (PPD), field of view (FoV), excellent color and image quality performance, not AI assistant.

TrendForce pointed out that if edge AI is forced to be installed, it will increase the weight of the entire system, shorten battery life, and increase costs.

From the perspective of product form, the current AR viewing glasses are essentially lightweight portable display terminals, not AI computing power carriers. Its competitiveness is concentrated in three aspects. The first is to achieve high resolution and high refresh rate based on OLEDoS, providing a virtual screen equivalent to more than 100 inches; the second is a 70-80g lightweight translucent design, which ensures immersion while reducing the burden of wearing; the third is good compatibility, which can be connected to mobile phones, PCs and game consoles through Type-C.

In the medium to long term, AR glasses for movie viewing will face two major challenges. First, the movie viewing scene is single and the market application is limited; second, the evolution of thin and light VR/MR devices will pose a threat to replace them. At the same time, full-color AR glasses with stronger computing power and spatial interaction may have a diversion effect on its users in the future. In the face of competition, mainstream brand manufacturers including XREAL, RayNeo, Rokid, Viture and INMO are currently focusing on the sales of movie-viewing AR glasses, continuing to strengthen display effects such as HDR, 10-bit color depth, etc.

TrendForce believes that AR applications are still in the early stages of exploration, and although movie-viewing AR glasses that lack end-side AI support will face double squeeze from VR/MR and full-color AR glasses in the future, as long as the display experience and wearing comfort continue to be enhanced, they will still maintain a place in the audio-visual entertainment market segment.