Meta hits market first with consumer AI device but strategy unproven

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has long been set on owning the hardware that consumers use to access his company’s apps. As he pushes to make the Muse AI agent the “centerpiece” of Meta’s AI strategy, he’s counting on a slew of forthcoming devices to turn his dream into reality.

At Meta’s annual Connect conference, which landed a week before OpenAI’s big event for developers, the company said that by the end of 2026, “there will be over 100 styles of AI glasses,” and Zuckerberg on Wednesday revealed a pendant called the Muse Charm, though he didn’t offer a price.

Meta was late to the generative AI game, badly trailing OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, which all have popular AI models and a host of services used by consumers and businesses. Zuckerberg is trying to make up for lost time with Muse, an app that can act as a personal assistant, responding to emails, booking travel and shopping on a user’s behalf.

Investors are buying in, lifting the stock 4.5% on Thursday and more than 25% since Meta announced Muse earlier this month. They’re betting that, while Zuckerberg never found a big market for virtual reality after changing his company’s name to Meta five years ago and shifting its strategy to the metaverse, he’s now on the right track.

“Meta Connect 2026 more explicitly attached Muse AI as a killer app fused deeply into the hardware strategy, from AR glasses and extending into Muse Charm, a dedicated keychain-like device providing rapid access to Muse,” wrote analysts at Mizuho, in a report on Thursday. The firm, which recommends buying the stock, said Meta’s AI advancements will continue “to drive multiple expansion in Meta shares.”

The Muse Charm resembles a cross between a kid’s Tamagotchi keychain and a wearable medical buzzer. Zuckerberg said Meta still needs to finalize the “finishing material” and “laying out the components” to have it ready to ship for the holidays.

As ChatGPT creator OpenAI gears up for its DevDay conference next week, anticipation has been building that Sam Altman’s company may show off its long-awaited hardware product, which will reportedly be a hockey puck-like speaker.

OpenAI didn’t respond to a request for comment.

In getting out ahead of OpenAI, Zuckerberg is building on the momentum of Muse, which skyrocketed to the top of Apple’s App Store, eclipsing ChatGPT. Meanwhile, OpenAI and Anthropic are dealing with intensifying concerns about their market-leading AI models, as critics and company execs sound the alarm about potential harms to humanity.

For Zuckerberg, the Muse Charm is just his latest hardware endeavor as he tries to end his company’s reliance on Apple for distribution. It’s been a particularly sticky matter since Apple changed its privacy policy in 2021, limiting the…