I wore Xgimi's AI smart glasses at CES, and I have at least one big note

CES is a time to try new things. Whatever your degree of cynicism, walking through the many halls of its many exposition centres and conferencing locations, it's hard not to have your eye caught by the odd sign or display with something new to try out.

That's my way of admitting that I've not used a lot of smart glasses in the recent past – we have other experts on the team at T3 who've tested more, but the way CES works out means you're not always in your comfort zone. So, I viewed Xgimi's launch of its new sub-brand MemoMind and its smart glasses as a great chance to see what some of the hype is about.

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These smart glasses come in two initial varieties, each likely to land at a different price. The flagship's Memo One, a pair with a display in each lens; then there's the Memo Air Display, which has only a single display to keep things lighter and more affordable (not that we have confirmed pricing for either).

I tried both, but the more interesting demo was the higher-end Memo One, since it was my first time dicing with a double display like this. To get the obvious out of the way, it worked – I could pretty clearly discern the neon-green display in my eyeline, and while my being a prescription specs-wearer did make things a little harder to gauge, it looked sharp and readable enough to my eyes.

That said, it's also a small display, even with Xgimi's included controls to change its size and positioning in your eyeline. Testing it out really underlined that we're not really close to the point where you can get a genuinely bright and adaptable display in your glasses without trade-offs.

While the big player in the space, the Meta Ray-Ban Display, might be further along, I can't speak to their performance without trying them, leaving me with just MemoMind to judge.

Going on what I saw alone, though, I'm not really won over. MemoMind's designs are nice enough on paper, and when I looked at the components that made up the glasses, they looked elegant. In practice, though, the glasses themselves weren't too pretty, the lower-cost pair featuring bulbous elements on their arms looking out of place.

The Memo Air is sleeker, to be fair, but still not exactly the most fashionable set of specs out there, and I'd say it'll find it difficult to compete with the popular and recognisable frame shapes used by Meta and Ray-Ban. In fact, part of me wonders whether that hints at Xgimi's plan here.

After all, while it has a deservedly impressive reputation in the projector space, smart glasses are a very different proposition. It won't be easy to crack that emerging market, but it might make more sense if it can attract a decent brand partner with these prototypes and early versions.

To be clear, that's pure speculation on my part, but it speaks to my experience with the MemoMind glasses – they're solid in some ways, but nowhere near the level of slickness that would persuade me to regularly wear them for long periods. I strongly suspect that'll be true of most smart glasses out there, though, so it's probably fair to say this is a solid enough start from Xgimi.