Sources: Snap is planning to release new Spectacles with two cameras and an aluminum frame for $350 by the year's end
Snap Inc. is planning to release a new version of its Spectacles glasses with two cameras and a higher price point of $350 by the end of the year, Cheddar has learned.
Context & Ripple Effects
Snap has been walking Spectacles upmarket since the original $130 launch in 2016: Spectacles 2.0 arrived at $150 with water resistance and faster transfers, and Cheddar's own March reporting sketched a two-generation roadmap — a performance-focused refresh first, then a third-gen model with two cameras for 3D-like depth effects. This report pulls that two-camera version forward: aluminum frame, dual cameras, AR imagery projected onto the lenses, and a $350 price targeted for year-end.
The significance is positioning, not just specs. At $350, Spectacles stops being a $130 novelty accessory and becomes a premium camera device — and the added depth-sensing hardware is the substrate Snap needs if its lens-based AR ambitions are ever going to live on a face rather than a phone screen.
First-order effects
- Snap's own product ladder gets a new top rung: a $350 aluminum-framed, dual-camera Spectacles sits above the $150 Spectacles 2.0, asking buyers to pay more than double for depth capture and AR optics.
Second-order effects
- The two-tier lineup creates a cannibalization question inside Snap's own catalog — if the $350 model delivers the depth effects that made two cameras the headline feature, the cheaper tier's reason to exist narrows to price alone.
Third-order effects
- The cadence here — a year-end target that the related coverage shows ultimately surfacing as the $380 Spectacles 3 with its second HD camera — suggests Snap treats Spectacles as a multi-year sensor platform, each generation adding capture hardware en route to true AR eyewear, with pricing ratcheting upward rather than down.
The trend: Camera glasses are climbing from cheap novelty accessories toward premium sensor platforms, with Snap using successive Spectacles generations to ratchet price and capability toward AR-ready hardware.