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The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses.

Jake Piazza | CNBC

Meta released the second generation of its Ray-Ban glasses in October. I’ve been testing them over the last couple of weeks and I really like them, even after factoring in the premium you pay in comparison to regular Ray-Bans.

The $299 Headliner model I have feels identical to traditional Ray-Bans but with more smarts. Similar to the first model, they allow you to capture video, snap pictures, place calls through your phone and listen to music. The speakers also are 50% louder, according to Meta. There’s also a better camera that takes photos in portrait mode instead of landscape, which makes them better suited for social media posts.

Meta’s Reality Labs unit, which includes its wearable products such as the smart glasses and the Meta Quest, contributes less than 1% to the company’s revenue. Even so, its wearables represent Meta’s attempt at making headway in the devices space in addition to its massive advertising and social media presence.

Here’s what you should know about the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

What’s good

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

The Ray-Ban Meta glasses are marketed to show that they can be worn every day just like a regular pair of sunglasses. To do that, they need to be as comfortable, stylish and useful as your regular pair. Meta and Ray-Ban nailed that aspect.

They’re comfortable to wear and aren’t clunky. They weigh just a few grams more than regular Ray-Ban glasses. And, while I was testing out the glasses in the office, I was asked several times why I was wearing sunglasses indoors, so that gives you a gauge of how similar they look to classic Ray-Bans. They don’t look weird.

I wore my smart sunglasses without using any of the tech features, and they work just as well as a normal pair of polarized Ray-Ban sunglasses. For people who want to replace their corrective lenses, you can get prescription lenses just like you would with the pair you already use.

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

They’re convenient if you want to take pictures in the moment without having to reach for your phone. You just press a button on the right side of your glasses or say, “Hey Meta, take a photo.” I liked using them to snap pictures walking around New York City. Just check out this side by side of the same tree. The one on the left is taken with my iPhone and the one on the right is taken with my glasses.

The photo on the left was taken with an iPhone 14. The photo on the right was taken with the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

Jake Piazza | CNBC

It’s easy to import the pictures or videos to the Meta View app on a phone, and then you can save them to your camera roll.

It’s obvious to others when you’re taking a photo or video. The circle on the right side of the glasses flashes when you take a photo and it pulses when you’re filming, so it would be difficult to take a photo or video without someone noticing.

That’s an important feature for Ray-Ban Meta glasses to become engrained into mainstream society. People around you know when you’re recording. You can’t even block the light and take a photo. The glasses will refuse to snap the picture if you try.

An LED flash goes off when you take a photo with the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

Jake Piazza | CNBC

The audio and calling capabilities are my favorite part, though.

You can use the glasses in place of your earbuds. I walked around New York’s Central Park with them while listening to music and prefer the audio experience over earbuds in a setting like this. The sound is still full, but I was more attune to my surroundings, which was helpful when an unleashed dog ran up to me and when a biker sped through a red light.

Listening to music is sort of like having a soundtrack playing in the background, as opposed to an immersive experience that many new headphones provide. I’ll admit, I don’t have AirPods with the noise transparency option so it’s worth comparing that feature if you have the AirPods Pro or AirPods Max.

There is definitely more audio leakage with these than I found in my 3rd Generation AirPods, so I’d probably still go with earbuds on the train if you don’t want to bug your fellow passengers. But the glasses were quiet enough that they didn’t bother my roommate while I listened to music at home.

I liked that I could tap once on the right side of the glasses to pause and resume my music and could slide my finger to adjust the volume.

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

The glasses also work well for phone calls. I made calls with them, both in my room and in noisy areas, and the recipients had no complaints about the audio quality. The conversation on my end was clear and I liked that I could accept incoming calls by double-tapping on the right side.

They’re easy to charge. The glasses come in a hard shell case that charges the glasses when they are stored. You use a USB-C — which does not come with the glasses — to recharge the case, but you get roughly eight charges before you need to do that, which is a big step up from the three additional charges in the previous model.

What’s bad

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

My biggest knock on these glasses is that it’s difficult to take pictures if you’re wearing a ball cap. This isn’t an issue for someone who doesn’t wear hats, but it was annoying to have to push my bill slightly up whenever I wanted to snap a photo without the camera getting my hat in it, too.

Brims of hats get in the way when trying to take photos with the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

Jake Piazza | CNBC

While the glasses let you use voice commands to send messages or ask questions such as “What’s the weather?” it felt more like a novelty to me and I can’t see myself consistently using them. I’m also a big sports fan, and this voice assistant can’t tell you the score of the game from last night like other assistants.

If you use Siri or Google Assistant on a watch or phone often, then you may find some of the voice commands useful. I just don’t use them often.

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

The battery life isn’t great if you want to use these as your all-day, every day glasses. They get roughly four hours of battery life for mixed use, which is a combination of all the features the glasses offer, but that can vary depending on how sparingly or not you use them. My review unit charged from 7% to full in about 50 minutes, which is fast.

But if you need to wear them all day with prescription lenses, then you might run into some issues, at least with the full functionality, since you don’t really have the option to just take them off and let the glasses charge in the middle of your day.

Finally, the glasses are water resistant, but not waterproof, so you have to be cautious in rainy weather in a way that you don’t have to be with regular glasses.

Should you buy them?

The Ray-Ban Meta Headliner smart glasses. 

Jake Piazza | CNBC

I’d buy them. I really enjoyed the music, headset and photo features of these glasses, and because they still retain the comfort and style of classic Ray-Bans.

Normal black Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses cost $171. The Meta version of those costs $299. Is the ability to snap pictures and videos of your surroundings and use them in place of earbuds and a headset worth the additional money to you? It is for me.

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Stocks end November with mixed results despite a strong Thanksgiving week rally

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Stocks end November with mixed results despite a strong Thanksgiving week rally

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Palantir has worst month in two years as AI stocks sell off

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Palantir has worst month in two years as AI stocks sell off

CEO of Palantir Technologies Alex Karp attends the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S., July 15, 2025.

Nathan Howard | Reuters

It’s been a tough November for Palantir.

Shares of the software analytics provider dropped 16% for their worst month since August 2023 as investors dumped AI stocks due to valuation fears. Meanwhile, famed investor Michael Burry doubled down on the artificial intelligence trade and bet against the company.

Palantir started November off on a high note.

The Denver-based company topped Wall Street’s third-quarter earnings and revenue expectations. Palantir also posted its second-straight $1 billion revenue quarter, but high valuation concerns contributed to a post-print selloff.

In a note to clients, Jefferies analysts called Palantir’s valuation “extreme” and argued investors would find better risk-reward in AI names such as Microsoft and Snowflake. Analysts at RBC Capital Markets raised concerns about the company’s “increasingly concentrated growth profile,” while Deutsche Bank called the valuation “very difficult to wrap our heads around.”

Adding fuel to the post-earnings selloff was the revelation that Burry is betting against Palantir and AI chipmaker Nvidia. Burry, who is widely known for predicting the housing crisis that occurred in 2008 and the portrayal of him in the film “The Big Short,” later accused hyperscalers of artificially boosting earnings.

Palantir CEO Alex Karp vocally hit the front lines, appearing twice in one week on CNBC, where he accused Burry of “market manipulation” and called the investor’s actions “egregious.”

“The idea that chips and ontology is what you want to short is bats— crazy,” Karp told CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”

Despite the vicious selloff, Palantir has notched some deal wins this month. That included a multiyear contract with consulting firm PwC to speed up AI adoption in the U.K. and a deal with aircraft engine maintenance company FTAI.

But those announcements did little to shake off valuation worries that have haunted all AI-tied companies in November.

Across the board, investors have viciously ditched the high-priced group, citing fears of stretched valuations and a bubble.

In November, Nvidia pulled back more than 12%, while Microsoft and Amazon dropped about 5% each. Quantum computing names such as Rigetti Computing and D-Wave Quantum have shed more than a third of their value.

Apple and Alphabet were the only Magnificent 7 stocks to end the month with gains.

Sill, questions linger over Palantir’s valuation, and those worries aren’t a new concern.

Even after its steep price drop, the company’s stock trades at 233 times forward earnings. By comparison, Nvidia and Alphabet traded at about 38 times and 30 times, respectively, at Friday’s close.

Karp, who has long defended the company, didn’t miss an opportunity to clap back at his critics, arguing in a letter to shareholders that the company is making it feasible for everyday investors to attain rates of return once “limited to the most successful venture capitalists in Palo Alto.”

“Please turn on the conventional television and see how unhappy those that didn’t invest in us are,” Karp said during an earnings call. “Enjoy, get some popcorn. They’re crying. We are every day making this company better, and we’re doing it for this nation, for allied countries.”

Palantir declined to comment for this story.

WATCH: Palantir CEO Alex Karp: We’ve printed venture results for the average American

Palantir CEO Alex Karp: We've printed venture results for the average American

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CME disruption, Black Friday, the K-beauty boom and more in Morning Squawk

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CME disruption, Black Friday, the K-beauty boom and more in Morning Squawk

CME Group sign at NYMEX in New York.

Adam Jeffery | CNBC

This is CNBC’s Morning Squawk newsletter. Subscribe here to receive future editions in your inbox.

Here are five key things investors need to know to start the trading day:

1. Down and out

Stock futures trading was halted this morning after a data center “cooling issue” took down several Chicago Mercantile Exchange services. Individual stocks were still trading before the bell, while the CME said futures indexes and options trading would open fully at 8:30 a.m. Follow live markets updates here.

The stock market has rebounded during the holiday-shortened trading week. But the three major indexes are still on pace to end November’s trading month — which ends with today’s closing bell — in the red. The Dow and S&P 500 are poised to snap six-month winning streaks, while the Nasdaq Composite is on track to see its first negative month in eight.

Today’s trading session ends early at 1 p.m. ET.

2. Shopping and dropping

A Black Friday sale sign is displayed in a shop window at an outlet mall in Carlsbad, California, U.S., Nov. 25, 2025.

Mike Blake | Reuters

Black Friday was once considered the biggest in-person shopping day of the year, drawing huge crowds to stores in search of bargains. But while millions are still expected to partake in the occasion, it’s not what it used to be.

Here’s what to know:

  • In the past six years, online sales have outpaced brick-and-mortar spending on Black Friday. Data shows in-person foot traffic has been mostly flat over the last few years, as well.
  • No matter where they make their purchases, shoppers are also skeptical that they’re getting the best deals.
  • As CNBC’s Gabrielle Fonrouge reports, the shift has meant a change in strategy for many of the retail industry’s biggest names. Some have started offering their holiday sales earlier in the season, while others are spacing out their promotions.
  • Deloitte reported that the average consumer will shell out $622 between Nov. 27 and Dec. 1, a decrease of 4% from last year.
  • Even as the day of deals loses its allure, AT&T found that Gen Z participates the most, while their older counterparts do their shopping closer to Christmas.

3. AI comeback

Cfoto | Future Publishing | Getty Images

Alphabet has been a notable exception to the recent tech downturn. Shares of the Google parent have surged more than 13% this month as Wall Street sees the company as an AI leader.

Alphabet began the month by announcing its latest tensor processing units, or TPUs, called Ironwood. Last week, the company launched its latest AI model, Gemini 3, which caught positive attention from Silicon Valley heavyweights.

Shares of the stock are now up close to 70% this year, making it the best-performer within megacap tech. But experts told CNBC’s Jennifer Elias that Alphabet’s lead in the competitive AI market is marginal and could be hard to hold onto.

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4. Tech’s tug of wars

Alibaba announced plans to release a pair of smart glasses powered by its AI models. The Quark AI Glasses are Alibaba’s first foray into the smart glasses product category.

Alibaba

The Alphabet-Nvidia AI race isn’t the only tech rivalry that has heated up in recent days.

Alibaba‘s AI-powered smart glasses went on sale yesterday. With its new wearable tech offering, the Chinese tech company is going up against major players — namely Meta, which unveiled its smart glasses with Ray Ban in September.

Meanwhile, Counterpoint Research found Apple is poised to ship more smartphones than Samsung this year for the first time in 14 years. Apple is also poised to boast a larger market share, driven by strong iPhone 17 sales.

5. From Seoul to Los Angeles

Carly Xie looks over facial mask items at the Face Shop, which specializes in Korean cosmetics, in San Francisco, April 15, 2015.

Avila Gonzalez | San Francisco Chronicle | Hearst Newspapers | Getty Images

American shoppers are increasingly looking to South Korea for their cosmetics. NielsenIQ found U.S. sales of so-called “K-beauty” products are slated to surge more than 37% this year to above $2 billion.

Retailers ranging from beauty product hubs Ulta and Sephora to big-box chains Walmart and Costco are jumping on the trend. On top of that, Olive Young — aka the “Sephora of Seoul” — is opening its first U.S. store in Los Angeles next year.

The Daily Dividend

Here are some stories worth circling back to over the weekend:

CNBC’s Chloe Taylor, Gabrielle Fonrouge, Laya Neelakandan, Jessica Dickler, Sarah Min, Sean Conlon, Jennifer Elias, Arjun Kharpal and Luke Fountain contributed to this report. Josephine Rozzelle edited this edition.

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