Apple targets WWDC 2027 for smart glasses built around privacy

Apple’s smart glasses now have a date, and privacy is the whole pitch.

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported on July 26 that Apple plans to unveil its first smart glasses at WWDC in June 2027, with shipments targeted for late 2027. After years of rumors, the product finally has a public timeline.

The camera question

The open question inside Apple is the camera. According to the report, there are two options on the table: drop the camera entirely, or restrict it so it cannot capture user-initiated photos and video at all. In the second scenario, the camera would serve only as the eyes of Siri’s visual intelligence, letting the assistant see what the wearer sees without ever recording it.

Either choice would make the product a deliberate contrast with what already exists in the category.

The context writes the marketing

Meta created the smart glasses category, and it created the category’s privacy baggage along with it. Instagram just banned videos filmed covertly on smart glasses, a policy move that underlined how uneasy the public conversation around camera glasses has become.

Apple appears ready to lean into that gap. The company is prototyping new hardware and software privacy features for the glasses and is expected to position them directly against Meta’s Ray-Bans. If Meta’s glasses are cameras you wear, Apple’s pitch would be glasses that can see but never record.

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Gurman’s report included more of Apple’s forward roadmap: three new Apple Watch models, refreshes across the Mac line, and a device leasing program.

The glasses remain the headline, though, because they test an unusual bet: that in a category defined by recording everything, the winning product might be the one that promises not to. Would you wear glasses that can see but not record? Apple seems ready to find out in June 2027.