XREAL Aura — specification and verdict
Aura is the first XREAL device that is not a screen you wear. It runs Android XR with 6DoF tracking and hand tracking, which means content stays where you put it in the room rather than floating in front of your face. The optics are birdbath again — XREAL’s house design, and the reason the field of view is 70 degrees rather than the 50 of the One — behind dual micro-OLED panels. Compute is split: XREAL’s own X1S chip sits in the glasses and drives the display, while a Snapdragon Reality Elite in a separate puck does the Android XR work. XREAL lists the glasses at 95 grams and the 12 GB and 256 GB configuration at 1,279 US dollars, or 1,499 dollars for 16 GB and 512 GB, with the compute puck in the box. Orders opened on 7 October 2026 to people who had already reserved, in the US, Canada, Japan and South Korea, and XREAL expects to ship before the holidays.
For a training fleet the interesting part is the platform: Android XR takes an ordinary Android package, which is the same door our courses already walk through on PICO and Meta hardware. What does not exist yet is everything around it — nothing shipping yet, no device management, no enterprise programme, and a compute puck that is one more thing to charge and lose in a shared room. So the honest answer to "will our courses run on it" is no, today, and "probably, eventually" is not something this table is willing to say. Watch for the first deliveries, and for whether XREAL ships anything resembling fleet tooling.
What is known: the platform, the display and optics, the field of view, the split-compute design, the weight, the price from 1,279 US dollars and a shipping window before the 2026 holidays. What is not: the battery life, a shipping date and the entire enterprise story. The reason to keep an eye on this one is that it is the first Android XR device with a genuinely wide field of view, and XREAL has now put a price on it: if it delivers, the gap between "wearable monitor" and "spatial computer" gets cheaper to cross. Only people who reserved earlier can order and nothing has shipped, so there is still nothing to plan a rollout around.
How it compares within its class
The axis runs from the lowest to the highest published figure among the AR — spatial devices in this catalogue. The grey tick is the median of that class.
Median for this class: 51°, from 9 models that publish the figure.
Median for this class: 116 g, from 10 models that publish the figure.
Median for this class: 1500 nits, from 5 models that publish the figure.
Median for this class: $1650, from 10 models that publish the figure.
Controllers and hand tracking
Operated by Voice · Look and pinch.
Bare hands
Full hand skeleton
The application receives a jointed hand pose, so a scenario can check what the fingers are doing and draw the hand as it moves.
Hand tracking SDK: Android XR / OpenXR XR_EXT_hand_tracking
Full specification
An em dash means the manufacturer does not publish that figure.
- ManufacturerWho makes it — and who you buy support from.
- XREAL
- CategoryWhich kind of product this is. It decides which rows below make sense at all.
- AR — spatial
- Device typeWhere the computing happens, and therefore what you need to run it.
- AR with a compute puck
- AnnouncedThe day it was shown, which is not the day it shipped.
- Announced: not published by the manufacturer
- ReleasedYear the model went on sale. Older is not automatically worse in this category.
- 2026
- AvailabilityWhether you can still order it new today.
- Announced for 2026-Q4
- Support endsThe date the manufacturer stops supporting it. Decisive for a fleet you are about to buy.
- Support ends: not published by the manufacturer
- DisplayHow the image is produced. "No display" is a real answer in this category, not a gap.
- Birdbath optics
- Eyes coveredOne eye or both. Over a full shift this is a real difference in fatigue.
- Both eyes
- Resolution per eyePixels delivered to each eye. Higher means small text and labels stay readable.
- 1920x1200
- Refresh rateImages per second. Higher feels smoother and helps people prone to motion discomfort.
- 120 Hz
- Field of viewHow much of your view the image covers. Bigger is more immersive, not automatically better for work.
- 70°
- Pixel densityPixels per degree of view — the honest way to compare sharpness between a headset and a pair of glasses. Higher is sharper. Only shown where somebody published it; we never compute it ourselves.
- 32 PPD
- BrightnessIn a plant or outdoors, brightness decides legibility more than resolution does.
- 1050 nits
- WeightThe device alone. Anything above roughly 150 g is felt within an hour.
- 95 g
- Visible field of viewWhat the eye actually sees through the optics, by axis.
- Visible field of view: not published by the manufacturer
- Rendered field of viewWhat the device draws. Never smaller than what you see.
- Rendered field of view: not published by the manufacturer
- Binocular overlapWhere both eyes see the same thing — this is where depth happens.
- Binocular overlap: not published by the manufacturer
- Average pixel densityPixels per degree across the image. More is sharper.
- Average pixel density: not published by the manufacturer
- Peak pixel densityThe sharpest point, usually the centre of the lens.
- Peak pixel density: not published by the manufacturer
- Subpixel layoutHow the coloured dots sit in a pixel. A stripe looks cleaner on text than PenTile.
- Subpixel layout: not published by the manufacturer
- Foveated renderingWhether detail is dropped outside where you look, to save performance.
- Foveated rendering: not published by the manufacturer
- Vision correctionHow somebody who wears glasses uses it, and in what dioptre range.
- Vision correction: not published by the manufacturer
- DimensionsWidth, height and depth of the device itself.
- Dimensions: not published by the manufacturer
- Weight with strapWith the strap it ships with — the weight you actually wear.
- Weight with strap: not published by the manufacturer
- Head strapSoft band or a rigid one. Decides how the weight sits over an hour.
- Glasses frame
- MaterialsShell and facial interface, in the vendor’s words.
- Materials: not published by the manufacturer
- ColoursColours the manufacturer sells it in.
- Colours: not published by the manufacturer
- Haptics in the headsetVibration in the headset itself, not in the controllers.
- Haptics in the headset: not published by the manufacturer
- TrackingWhether content stays put in the room (6DoF), follows head rotation (3DoF) or is simply fixed.
- 6DoF (position in space)
- Tracking camerasHow many cameras it uses to know where it is.
- 2
- Tracking rateHow often position is recalculated. Higher is steadier.
- Tracking rate: not published by the manufacturer
- Depth sensorA dedicated sensor for distance, on top of the cameras.
- Depth sensor: not published by the manufacturer
- Hand trackingWhether bare hands can operate the interface, without a controller or the phone.
- Yes
- Hand tracking detailHow much of the hand reaches the application: a pinch, or a jointed hand pose a scenario can read.
- Full hand skeleton
- Hands and controllers at onceWhether a controller in one hand and a bare hand in the other work at the same time.
- Hands and controllers at once: not published by the manufacturer
- Hand tracking SDKThe SDK an application reaches the hand tracking through, and any named modes that change how it behaves.
- Android XR / OpenXR XR_EXT_hand_tracking
- Face trackingTracks facial expression — for avatars, not for training scenarios.
- Face tracking: not published by the manufacturer
- Body trackingHow much of the body the device knows about. Estimated legs are not tracked legs.
- Body tracking: not published by the manufacturer
- Controllers includedWhether motion controllers come in the box, or are bought separately — or the device is hands-only.
- Controllers included: not published by the manufacturer
- Controller tracking6DoF controllers track position and rotation, so a hand reaches in space; 3DoF only point. “None” means hands only.
- Controller tracking: not published by the manufacturer
- Other input methodsWays in beyond controllers and bare hands.
- Voice · Look and pinch
- Where it computesWhether the device computes on its own or depends on a phone, PC or belt-worn puck.
- Driven by a belt-worn puck
- ProcessorThe processor and memory inside. This is what the performance grade above is derived from.
- Qualcomm Snapdragon Reality Elite (puck) + XREAL X1S coprocessor
- CPUCores and clocks, where the manufacturer publishes them.
- CPU: not published by the manufacturer
- GPUThe graphics part of the chip.
- GPU: not published by the manufacturer
- MemoryRAM on the device. Together with the chipset it sets how complex a scene can be.
- 12 GB
- PlatformThe platform an application is built against — and what an MDM has to speak.
- Android XR
- StorageOn-board space for downloaded courses. More matters for an offline library in several languages.
- 256 GB · 512 GB
- SD card slotWhether storage can be added with a card.
- SD card slot: not published by the manufacturer
- BatteryRuntime as the manufacturer states it. A hot-swappable pack matters more than the figure.
- Battery: not published by the manufacturer
- Battery capacity (Wh)Energy in the cell. Bigger is longer, given the same power draw.
- 34.84 Wh
- Battery capacity (mAh)The same fact in the other unit vendors use. We never convert between the two.
- 4455 mAh
- Charge timeFrom empty to full. Rarely stated by the manufacturer, so it usually comes from whoever timed it.
- Charge time: not published by the manufacturer
- ChargerPower of the supplied charger — it decides the charge time above.
- 65 W
- External batteryBattery on a cable or a puck instead of on the head.
- External battery: not published by the manufacturer
- Charging caseExtra runtime carried in the case the glasses ship with.
- Charging case: not published by the manufacturer
- Hot-swap batteryWhether a charged battery can replace the empty one without ending the session. This is what decides if a headset can hold an all-day training station.
- Hot-swap battery: not published by the manufacturer
- Third-party appsHow a third party's application reaches the device: an ordinary Android package, a vendor-only SDK, or not at all.
- Ordinary Android app (APK)
- Runs Skillsive appsOur own statement about whether Skillsive training applications run on it today.
- No
- Suitable for trainingOur judgement on whether it survives real deployment: comfort, hygiene, fleet management.
- Suitable for training: not published by the manufacturer
- Kiosk mode / MDMVendor tooling to enrol devices, push an app and lock the headset to it. Practically required above ten devices.
- No
- Business tierAn official business tier, so devices belong to the company rather than to employees’ personal accounts.
- Business tier: not published by the manufacturer
- CertificationsIndustrial certifications stated on the manufacturer's own page. Empty means unconfirmed, never "probably fine".
- Certifications: not published by the manufacturer
- PortsPhysical sockets and charging contacts.
- USB Type-C
- Wi-FiThe Wi-Fi generation — it decides how well wireless streaming holds up.
- 6/6E
- BluetoothFor controllers, headphones and accessories.
- 5.3
- Video from a computerWhether a computer can drive it, over a cable or wirelessly.
- Video from a computer: not published by the manufacturer
- AudioBuilt-in sound. Matters most where somebody has to hear a remote expert while working.
- Built-in speakers
- MicrophoneBuilt-in microphone — the other half of talking to a remote expert.
- Yes
- MicrophonesHow many. An array picks a voice out of a noisy hall; one does not.
- 4
- CameraA camera is what makes a remote expert call and photo documentation possible.
- Yes
- Price bandThe band it sits in, rather than a price that goes stale.
- Premium
- Launch priceThe manufacturer's launch price. Fixed history, so it never goes stale.
- $1279
- Price by configurationWhat each configuration cost at launch.
- 12 GB / 256 GB $1279 · 16 GB / 512 GB $1499
- Price todayApproximate current net price in USD — a general figure, since these barely differ between regions once tax is stripped out. A snapshot from the date shown, not an offer.
- Price today: not published by the manufacturer
Who this device is for
Aura is XREAL's announced Android XR device: a 70-degree field of view driven by a tethered puck, built with Google as part of the Android XR platform. For us the interesting part is the platform rather than the glasses — Android XR is the third standalone ecosystem alongside Horizon OS and PICO OS, and where it lands affects what our applications target next.
What is missing, and what the manufacturer does not publish
The price and part of the specification are now published. XREAL lists the Aura at 1,279 US dollars with 12 GB and 256 GB, or 1,499 with 16 GB and 512 GB, gives the glasses as 95 g and the display as 1,050 nits at its maximum, and publishes the battery cell but no runtime. XREAL gives no shipping date, only that it expects to ship before the holidays, and orders are open just to people who reserved earlier, in four countries. Independent coverage so far is hands-on previews, not tests of a retail unit, and no device management has been announced.
XREAL Aura — frequently asked questions
- What is XREAL Aura and how is it different from XREAL One?
- Aura is an announced Android XR device with a tethered compute puck and a 70-degree field of view — a spatial computer rather than a display for your phone. The One line shows a screen from a device you already own; Aura is meant to run its own applications.
- When will XREAL Aura be available?
- XREAL expects to ship before the holidays, starting in the US, Canada, Japan and South Korea, and on 7 October 2026 it opened orders to people who had already reserved. Public ordering is planned for the following weeks. The glasses with the compute puck are listed at 1,279 US dollars with 12 GB and 256 GB and 1,499 with 16 GB and 512 GB; we record the date as the fourth quarter of 2026, because XREAL names no day.
Compare this device
Consider these too
The nearest devices in the same class, ranked by availability and launch price — not by our opinion of them.
Specifications checked against the manufacturer's page on 2026-10-16. Manufacturer's specification
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