- [Michael] Sponsored by Surfshark VPN.
Can you tell these are smart glasses?
Nope, bet you can't.
See, wearable tech isn't just for wrists anymore.
Over the past few years,
I've covered tech-infused jackets, rings, badges.
Last year it made the jump to mainstream eyewear
with the Bose Frames and Focals by North,
and now Amazon's getting into the game.
I'm Michael Fisher, and this is the Mr. Mobile review
of the Echo Frames.
(upbeat music)
It's really amazing what the miniaturization of technology
has made possible.
The Echo Frames feel impossibly light in the hand
which means they just barely perch on your nose.
I can wear these all day with no problem
even in a rainstorm thanks to the IPX4 rating.
And I can go that whole day
with no one knowing I'm wearing smart glasses either.
Aside from the arms being a little thicker than normal,
there's nothing that gives these away.
That's because what's inside is just the essentials.
Amazon built these to give you the power
to summon Alexa at any moment,
so you've got two microphones and four micro speakers.
There's no heads-up display, no screen of any kind.
The only visual element is an LED over the right eye
that cues you when Alexa's listening, it's blue,
and it let's you know when your mic is off, red.
Double click the arm button
to mute the mic, turn off notifications,
and do it again (handle beeping)
to open it back up.
- [Alexa] Mic and notifications on.
- [Michael] Behind that you've got a volume rocker,
and take a 90 degree turn around the arm
to find a gesture area that you can tap or swipe.
So, what can you do with all this stuff?
Well, pretty much anything you can do with an Amazon Echo.
For obvious reasons,
I spent most of this weekend sanitizing
and deep cleaning my apartment,
and in the process I played games and listened to the radio,
listened to podcasts, all through my glasses.
I even called a bunch of my family and friends
like I recommended you do in my Mr. Mobile Stays Home video.
Those callers couldn't tell I wasn't using my phone.
Just one person reported an increased echo at one point.
Bluetooth range was excellent.
I found I could be 20 to 30 feet away from my phone
while talking or listening
with no degradation in quality.
And whether it was a podcast, or a phone call,
or a Pinback track, I could hear perfectly fine
without shutting myself off from the outside world
so I didn't miss a doorbell,
or when walking to the store, traffic.
Even when I wasn't listening to anything,
the convenience of having your notifications read to you
is pretty great.
Alexa just pipes up and says, "Gmail" or "Telegram".
And you can tap to dismiss,
or swipe to hear her read the message.
I wish it was swipe to dismiss, and tap to hear,
it feels backwards the way it is, but you get used to it.
Oh, and if you're more of a Google kind of person,
the functionality's more limited,
but just press and hold on the gesture area.
You can talk to Assistant instead.
So far, they sound pretty great,
so why wouldn't you want a pair of Echo Frames, right?
Well, I'll cover the downsides,
and the biggest impediment for about half of you
right after this.
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Some of the downsides to the Echo Frames are obvious.
For one, you get a lot more sound bleed with these
than you do with headphones,
and while they're good for the radio or podcasts,
you really don't wanna listen to music with these.
I tested 'em side-by-side with the Bose Frames
playing OMCs finest,
and the Bose ones just blew 'em away
from volume to bass, everything was better.
Not that there's anything bizarre about that,
it's just somethin' to keep in mind
if you're planning to use these as surrogate headphones.
Oh and also, neither set of glasses
is loud enough to overcome
pretty much any kind of street noise.
(truck engine rumbling)
The other little let down is battery life.
There's not much room in these for a power cell,
so the two hours I spent talking on the phone
while cleaning my place,
that's exactly how long it took
to drain them from full to empty.
While they're meant to be used more intermittently,
and they charge completely in less than an hour,
you'll be charging these every night at minimum.
Oh, and if you have an iPhone,
well for now, you're outta luck.
These work with Android phones only.
So, how much will you pay for the privilege?
Well, right now these are classified
as an Amazon Day One Product
which means they're available only by invitation.
If you get one of those invitations,
you get 'em for 180 bucks,
not counting any prescription lenses you might need.
Yes, they are available from some third-party sellers.
If they eventually go on sale to the public at large,
they'll cost $250, which frankly, is a harder sell.
And there's the biggest argument
against the category as a whole.
Smart glasses are kinda superfluous, right?
I mean, you can accomplish much of the same convenience
with a combination of a smartwatch and headphones.
But really, the Echo Frames
are like the tech I opened this video with.
Like Project Jacquard or the Motiv Ring,
they're a preview of a world where you have the option
of making the stuff you wear everyday anyway more useful
by embedding technology inside of it.
Having Alexa within voice range for the past week
without having to even think about where my phone was,
that was an addictive convenience.
In any case, the wearable tech revolution
is just getting started,
and the Echo Frames are a better-than-average example
of that revolution starting to bear useful fruit.
(mid-tempo music)
Special thanks to Jeramy Johnson
for lending me his Echo Frames sample for this video.
Check out his review at Android Central
for all the stuff I left on the cutting room floor.
That link is in the description.
Reminder that Mr. Mobile doesn't produce paid reviews.
Amazon was given no copy approval,
or editorial input into this video.
They're seeing it for the first time right alongside you.
Please subscribe if that's the kind of content
you'd like to see more of.
Until next time, thanks for watching,
and stay mobile, my friends.
(upbeat music)