Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg took the stage Wednesday at the company's annual developer conference surfing a wave of hype for Muse, its new AI agent, and hoping to keep the momentum rolling by showcasing how its new technology merges with its existing suite of products.
The conference, where Meta releases and lets developers test out its latest hardware, made clear how the company sees its once disparate bets finally coming together. Zuckerberg has said consumers deserve "personal superintelligence" and Muse is the linchpin in that vision.
"Sometimes whole years are hard," he said during the conference keynote. "But we build because this is who we are, and the centerpiece of what we're building is Muse."
Onstage, Zuckerberg announced several new pairs of glasses and features, including plans to incorporate the agent into the glasses in the coming months. The feature on the glasses would allow someone wearing them to activate the agent via a "wake word" and access it completely hands-free.
He also showed off a new hand-held device that fits on a keychain called "Muse Charm" that he said users would be able to use to talk to their Muse agent. The company is planning to have the device ready to ship in time for the holidays, he said.
Wearing a shirt that said "BUILDING IS MY LOVE LANGUAGE," Zuckerberg did a live demonstration of the new Muse feature on the glasses, asking his agent via his glasses to book some time on his calendar for an upcoming meeting with technology chief Andrew Bosworth. The demonstration appeared to work.
The integration of Muse on Meta's smartglasses could help drive further adoption of the AI agent, which is already off to a strong start. The goal, Meta said, is to be able to have people use their Muse agent without having to touch the app, which is currently No. 1 in Apple's App Store, at all.
The fusing of the company's AI software and smartglasses bets paints a picture of what Meta envisions the future will look like and also gives investors more details on how Meta plans to monetize its massive AI spending this year.
Thanks in part to a run-up in the share price earlier this week, Meta's stock is up 30% so far this month, putting it on pace for its best monthly performance since July 2013.
This year's conference is a far cry from its focus just a few years ago, when Zuckerberg declared the metaverse was the future and renamed his company accordingly.
At the annual conference called Meta Connect this year, there was virtually no talk of the former focus of the company. "We made the decision to focus a little bit less on the metaverse for now," Zuckerberg said, with the exception of what he called a recent breakthrough.
He announced that Meta had built a new pair of virtual-reality glasses. The glasses go on sale in spring 2027 for $1,299.
Here's what else Meta announced:
Audio-only smartglasses: Amid pushback and controversy over its video-recording glasses, Meta has opted to roll out a pair without cameras. The company said audio has been the most popular feature since day one.
A new generation of its popular Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses: The company also introduced other new frames, including a collaboration with Blackpink singer Lisa.
Hologram video-calling on Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses: Meta is rolling out the new feature that allows users to create a photorealistic digital version of their face that can pop up on calls in their augmented-reality glasses.
Live chatting and real-time conversations with Muse: Meta's AI agent is currently only accessible via messaging in its app. Soon, Meta said, users will be able to use a voice mode to talk to it directly and ask the agent to take care of tasks for them.
New Muse partnerships: Walmart, Sephora, Best Buy and Gap, among others. Over the weekend, Amazon blocked Muse from completing purchases on its site, saying it wasn't authorized to do so.
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