XREAL is introducing real-time 3D conversion capabilities to its flagship AR glasses, which the company says will convert any 2D content to 3D.
Xreal originally released its “Real 3D” software on the Xreal 1S AR glasses earlier this month, but now the company has rolled out an update for Xreal One and One Pro that enables optional real-time 3D to 2D content conversion.
According to the company, Real 3D requires no special video files, apps, DRM-protected content, or external software. All transformations occur in real-time on the device via the company’s X1 spatial computing chipset built into the One series glasses.
XREAL One Pro | Image provided by: XREAL
“Real 3D is proprietary player and format agnostic, so it works on connected desktops, consoles, phones, and other devices,” the company said, noting that content includes movies, streaming video, locally stored media, and games.
Xreal instructs Road to VR to do this by using the X1 chip’s NPU (Neural Processing Unit) to perform depth estimation inference on every incoming frame and generate corresponding left and right eye views with depth relationships.
The company says it is still investigating the Real 3D delay. In particular, the company says that compared to other display modes, real-time 3D conversion results in “slightly higher power consumption,” which Xreal says is around 300mW.
Additionally, Xreal tells Road to VR that the Real 3D technology was developed entirely in-house.
“We trained a very compact model that balances performance and power consumption specifically for integration onto the X1 chip. While real-time 3D conversion is relatively easy on high-end GPUs, there is no comparable solution in the industry that can work effectively on low-power platforms like X1.”
This Beijing-based AR glasses manufacturer sells a pretty wide range of AR glasses. All of them target traditional content consumption such as flat-screen games, TV, and movies, all running on their own Android-based operating systems.
Xreal recently became Google’s lead AR partner following an announcement that it had secured a $100 million funding round, as well as a multi-year extension to the deal that originally started in late 2024.
As a result, Xreal aims to bring Google’s Android XR operating system to its AR glasses over the next few years, with the launch of Xreal’s Project Aura expected to begin at some point this year. In the meantime, check out Project Aura’s recent practices here.
