Arccos Is Integrating With Meta AI Glasses: Is This A Good Thing?

Admit it, friends. You knew this day was coming, didn’t you?

Arccos has officially teamed up with Meta to bring full Arccos on-course functionality to your Meta AI smart glasses. When you’re on the course, you ask your Meta glasses questions and your Meta glasses, by connecting to your Arccos app, give you the answers.

It’s like having a somewhat impersonal personal caddie in your head.

Well, not in your head, but certainly on your head.

Let’s dive in to see what this is all about.

Arccos x Meta AI glasses

In the big picture, this is a very simple development. Meta and Arccos have teamed up to create a pathway for you, the golfer, to ask Arccos questions on the golf course and for Arccos, through the Meta glasses, to give you info.

By linking the Meta AI app to the Arccos app, the two platforms communicate.

For example, you’re in the fairway and you want the distance to the green. While wearing your glasses, you simply say, “Hey, Meta, how far to the green?” Meta immediately accesses info from the Arccos app and tells you through the glasses’ internal audio headphones.

Since Meta has access to all your Arccos data and Arccos’ AI-assisted strategy, you can ask what club you should use, or even what the smart play on a particular hole might be. According to Meta and Arccos, all those recommendations are based on your historical performance. You can also get weather-adjusted and slope-adjusted “plays like” distances, post-round analytics and a voice-activated score entry.

“Hey, Meta, put me down for a one putt double bogey.”

There’s no word on whether it’ll yell “Liar, liar, pants on fire” when you pick up after butchering a hole and say, “Hey, Meta. Put me down for a five.”

The new element here is that Arccos functionality is now voice-first instead of phone-first. You can now access all the information Arccos can provide in-round without pulling out your phone. The only thing you won’t see is the hole layout. You can, however, ask it how far to carry that bunker on the left or whether the water on the left is in play.

Revolutionary or evolutionary?

It’s really a little of both.

Let’s make sure we fully understand what Meta and Arccos are doing here. While we call Meta AI glasses “smart” glasses, they’re not really all that smart. Not on their own, at least. Something has to tell them what to do. That something is Arccos.

The revolutionary part is that this partnership (along with Meta integration with 18Birdies) is a first. It leverages Meta’s capabilities with Arccos’ data to provide real-time, context-specific, in-play assistance for any sport.

Nothing will be projected inside the glasses so you won’t see any text or hole layout. We did see a company at the PGA Show called Birdielens that’s coming out with just that technology. We hope to get a sample of those glasses to test soon.

This does qualify as “revolutionary” simply because it is a first. It’s also a first step. The mind can only imagine where this technology can go next. Will you be able to target a landmark, like the pin or a specific bunker and ask the distance? When faced with a blind shot to a green, will you be able to ask the glasses where you should aim?

The possibilities are fascinating.

In practice, however, this is more evolutionary than anything else. Stripped of the “wow” factory, this can be considered a new way of delivering information that you already have access to if you’re an Arccos user. If you already use Arccos and have Meta AI glasses, this is a great way to get more use out of the glasses. If you don’t have either, I’m not 100 percent certain this would prompt you to go out and buy both.

However, it is pretty cool.

What you need to know

You do need an Arccos account and either Arccos Air or Smart Sensors for game tracking to use this system. You’ll also need an active data connection for your phone. If you’re in a low-signal area, the technology might struggle.

And although you don’t need your phone out to use the system, you will need to be within Bluetooth range. If it’s cart path only, you won’t be able to leave your phone in the cart while you walk across the fairway to your ball.

But, hey, that’s life in the big city. Nothing’s perfect.

Both Meta and Arccos say any active use of Meta glasses will consume more battery life than passive wear and use. You should start each round with a full charge on your glasses.

Finally, there’s the question of wearing sunglasses when you play. I’ll wear shades between shots but usually don’t like to wear them while hitting the ball. When you take the Meta glasses off, don’t fold them up, as that kills the Bluetooth connection.

Obviously, you wouldn’t use this Meta–Arccos connection during competition unless the tournament committee approves.

Meta and Arccos are in the middle of a soft launch right now so it’s only available in the U.S. and Canada. They hope to roll it out globally soon.

We have a round planned for this weekend. We’ll give it a whirl and report back.

For more information, check out the Arccos website.