Google LLC has ended a project to build a pair of augmented reality glasses, according to a report Monday from Business Insider, citing multiple people familiar with the matter.

The project, known internally as “Project Iris,” was first reported in January 2022 by The Verge and described a device that was “still early in development” and resembled a pair of ski goggles. At the time it was expected that it would be launched in 2024.

However, Google employees revealed that this device was not Iris, and instead the foundation for a partner project with Samsung, while Iris would instead be a platform for devices that would look more like eyeglasses.

Augmented reality devices work by using prisms and glass to project computer-generated images or holograms directly onto a user’s vision, thus augmenting what they see. This way, objects, characters, user interface elements and other computer-generated graphics can be projected onto the world and appear to be part of physical reality. AR glasses are often more simple and project a heads-up display, text or other information onto a user’s vision.

In order to build and launch Iris, Google reportedly assigned about 300 employees and made acquisitions of AR companies. These included the purchase of North Inc. in 2020, a Canadian startup that developed AR glasses. An early version of Iris demoed in 2022 resembled North’s glasses that featured augmented reality language translation capabilities.

According to the Business Insider report, Google shuttered the project amid layoffs, reorganizations and the departure of Google’s Chief of Augmented and Virtual Reality Clay Bavor.

Since ending the project, Google has shifted its focus towards creating software platforms for AR with the intent of licensing it to other headset manufacturers as a framework. To that end, it’s building an Android extended reality, or XR, platform for Samsung’s headset. Extended reality is a broad term for augmented, virtual and mixed reality.

According to the report, Google sees this as an Android XR operating system. Google is also working on an Android “micro XR” platform for glasses.

The end of the Iris project follows Apple Inc. indefinitely postponing its own AR glasses in order to build and launch its much-anticipated mixed-reality headset, the Vision Pro. Apple originally intended to release its AR glasses, dubbed Apple Glass, this year but after technical challenges and multiple delays it was eventually pushed back indefinitely.

Meta Platforms Inc. is also pressing forward with its own augmented reality smart glasses. During a roadmap reveal in March, Alex Himel, Meta’s vice president of AR, said that the company was working on an “Innovation” line of AR glasses for early adopters that would provide fully-featured holographic overlays. Himel said that there could be an “internal launch” as early as 2024 for employees and developers to test the glasses and get experience with them long before they were market ready.

According to the Insider report, Google may yet bring its Iris glasses back and there are still teams experimenting with AR, but employees had been shifted away to work on the Android XR operating system and the Samsung partnership.

Photo: Google