Apple Will Launch AR Glasses as iPhone Accessory in 2020 Says Kuo

Veteran Apply analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has today claimed that Apple’s widely rumoured augmented reality (AR) glasses will launch in 2020 as an iPhone accessory, primarily taking a display role while wirelessly offloading computing, networking, and positioning to the iPhone (via MacRumors).

A previous report by Bloomberg has also claimed that Apple is readying an AR headset for release in 2019, although the company could ship a product in 2020. The report further noted that the headset would run on a new iOS-based custom operating system and dubbed “rOS”:

Designing the AR glasses to work as an iPhone accessory is also expected to allow Apple to keep the glasses slim and lightweight, rather than trying to pack in all the processing hardware into the one device.

Kuo believes Apple is aiming to begin mass-producing the glasses as early as the fourth quarter of this year, although he admits the timeframe could be pushed back to the second quarter of 2020.

Apple has been experimenting with virtual reality and augmented reality technologies for over a decade based on patent filings.