Meta has begun placing select features of its Ray-Ban Meta Gen 2 smart glasses behind a paid subscription tier. Owners who wish to unlock the full capabilities of the device will now need to enroll in the Meta One Premium plan, priced at $19.99 per month. The company has introduced what it describes as a “throughput rate limit,” a monthly cap that significantly restricts feature access for users who remain on a free plan.
Early Limit Targets On-Device Audio
The first function affected by the new restriction is conversation focus, a tool that amplifies the voice of a person speaking directly to the wearer to improve clarity in noisy environments. Going forward, non-subscribers will be limited to a total of three hours of use per month. Paying members receive a higher ceiling of 15 hours per month. Notably, conversation focus relies entirely on local processing and functions without an internet connection, meaning the restriction is not tied to cloud computing costs.
Platform Shift Raises Questions
By putting a hardware-native capability behind a recurring fee, Meta signals a broader strategic pivot toward monetizing software features independently of server expenses. The subscription design also introduces practical friction: users currently have no in-interface tool to track their remaining monthly allotment, and unused hours expire at the end of each billing cycle with no rollover. These constraints leave open the possibility that other AI-driven tools on the glasses could follow a similar exclusive path, a direction that would align with Meta’s growing emphasis on subscription revenue across its product ecosystem.
Sources: www.meta.com, www.theverge.com