The Snap Spectacles are a pair of sunglasses that connect to Snapchat and let you record snaps with the built-in camera. Snap bills these less as a legitimate feat in technology and more as just a fun “toy.” We agreed in our review. So what’s a toy if you don’t know how to have fun with it?
If you’re confused about how to properly set up and use your Spectacles, we’ve created a complete guide for you. Setup and usage is extraordinarily simple, so rest assured your cool glasses with a camera don’t feel as futuristic and foreign as they might sound.
Our Complete Guide for Snap Spectacles
First, unpack your glasses and get started hooking them up to Snapchat.
How to Set Up Your Spectacles
To get started with your Spectacles, you should first pair it with your Snapchat account. Do this by first turning on your phone’s Bluetooth if it’s not on already. Ensure the Bluetooth icon is present in the status bar.
Also make sure you have the latest version of Snapchat installed. Check the App Store to see if an update is available. If there isn’t one, you’re good to go.
Open Snapchat and swipe down to reveal the Snapcode. Now put your Spectacles on, look at the Snapcode, and press the button on the top left of your glasses just once. It’ll take a few seconds, but it should pair perfectly after that. That’s all there is to setting up!
How to Record With Your Spectacles
Recording with your Spectacles is easy too since the glasses have but one button. Press the button once to start recording. You should see a light at the top left of your vision indicating that the glasses are indeed recording. Plus anyone you’re facing will see a light indicator on one side letting them know that, at the very least, something techy and weird is happening. The glasses record for 10 seconds, long enough for one snap story.
Image credit: Snap
During this time, move around, and don’t look at anything you don’t want to record. Keep in mind that you’re essentially recording your own vision for 10 seconds.
The indicator light turns off when recording is complete. However, you can actually record up to 30 seconds of video by pressing the button once again while you’re already recording. This is tricky because you’d think pressing this would stop the recording. Nope — it actually extends the recording by an additional 10 seconds. Do this once more to extend to the full 30.
How to Post Videos to Snapchat with Spectacles
When I first got my Spectacles, I thought posting videos to Snapchat was as simple as smacking the record button. Unfortunately that isn’t the case. Recording from your Spectacles just saves video to your Snapchat Memories. The video doesn’t automatically post to your story.
That’s probably a good thing though since it prevents posting something you didn’t mean to record. However, it does make me wish there was just one more hardware button on the Spectacles. The second button would automatically post what you just recorded to your story. But I digress.
When you’re done recording, open the Snapchat app on your phone and swipe up to view your memories. The videos from your paired Spectacles will automatically begin importing. Videos from glasses have circular thumbnail images because they’re recorded in a special, round format. Here you can view them one by one and decide to share them to a few people or in your story for all friends to see.
How to Charge Spectacles
Spectacles come with a hard, yellow, triangular carrying case. It’s perhaps one of my favorite parts about the Spectacles because it also doubles as a charger.
Place the glasses inside of the case with proper alignment to tiny dock inside and they’ll begin to charge. The case has a built-in battery with enough juice to supply four full charges to the glasses.
Snap hasn’t been very clear on just how good or bad battery life is for the Spectacles, however in the Support pages it does say that the case has enough power for “hundreds” of snap videos. Hundreds is pretty vague though, but in my use the glasses do seem to get pretty decent battery life. I can easily take a couple dozen or so videos.
When the case itself runs out of battery, connect the charging cable to the backside and charge via USB. The cable uses a proprietary connection though so if you lose it you’ll have to buy a new one. If the glasses are inside, they’ll charge too.
The Spectacles are a fun $129 toy that are delightfully easy to set up straight out of the box and operate. Let us know in the comments what you’ve been snapping with them.
