Huawei

Huawei
Information
Type	Private (employee-owned)
Industry	Telecommunications, consumer electronics
Founded	1987
Founder	Ren Zhengfei
Headquarters	Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
Products	Smartphones, telecom equipment, VR headsets, smart glasses
Website	https://consumer.huawei.com

Huawei (Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.) is a Chinese multinational technology company headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. It was founded in 1987 by Ren Zhengfei, a former engineer in the People's Liberation Army, and grew from a reseller of imported telephone exchange equipment into the world's largest manufacturer of telecommunications networking gear and, at its peak, the world's largest smartphone vendor. The company is privately held and describes itself as employee-owned. In 2024 it reported global sales revenue of 862.1 billion yuan (about 118 billion US dollars), its second-highest figure on record.

Within consumer electronics, Huawei has shipped a series of Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality devices since 2016, mostly aimed at the Chinese domestic market. Its product line has spanned a smartphone-based mobile VR headset, the standalone-style Huawei VR 2, the compact phone-tethered Huawei VR Glass and its VR Glass 6DoF gaming variant, the lightweight Huawei Vision Glass display glasses, and a collaboration with the eyewear brand Gentle Monster on smart audio glasses.

History

Huawei was established in 1987 with roughly 21,000 yuan of start-up capital and began by reselling private branch exchange (PBX) telephone systems imported from Hong Kong. In the early 1990s the company shifted toward research and development and produced its first major in-house product, the C&C08 digital telephone switch, in 1993. Over the following decades it expanded across carrier network equipment, enterprise systems, and consumer devices, becoming the largest telecom equipment maker in the world.

The company's consumer business became a significant growth driver in the 2010s on the strength of its smartphone and wearables lines. In 2024 that segment generated 339 billion yuan, up 38.3 percent year on year, as a recovery in domestic smartphone sales took hold.

US sanctions

Effective May 16, 2019, the United States Department of Commerce added Huawei and dozens of its affiliates to the Entity List, restricting the company's access to US-origin technology and, later, to advanced semiconductors and Google software services. The restrictions heavily affected Huawei's smartphone business and its ability to ship certain consumer hardware to Western markets. The company has continued to operate and reported a revenue rebound from 2023 onward.

VR and AR products

Mobile VR (2016)

Huawei entered virtual reality in April 2016, unveiling a smartphone-based headset simply called Huawei VR at the Shanghai launch event for its P9 and P9 Plus phones. The device worked by slotting a compatible Huawei phone (the P9, P9 Plus, or Mate 8) into the viewer, and the user navigated content with a touchpad on the side. Huawei promoted it as the first mobile VR headset to support a 360-degree sound field through headphones. Later in 2016 Huawei announced support for Google's Daydream mobile VR platform, committing to Daydream-ready phones, headsets, and controllers.

Huawei VR 2 (2018)

The Huawei VR 2 was announced in China in late 2017 and made its international debut at CES 2018. Unlike the earlier slot-in design, it connected to phones, tablets, or a PC over USB-C and carried built-in displays rated at a 3K resolution of 1,600 by 1,440 pixels per eye with a 90Hz refresh rate, a design intended to reduce motion sickness. At the show Huawei demonstrated the headset connected to a PC running Steam, with a custom controller, alongside its use as a mobile headset, positioning it as a hybrid that could serve both phone and PC virtual reality. Pricing for markets outside China was not announced.

Huawei VR Glass (2019)

The Huawei VR Glass was announced in September 2019 and demonstrated at the World Conference on VR Industry in Nanchang, China, that October. It marked a sharp departure in form factor: a slim, sunglasses-style headset only 26.6 mm thick at the optics and weighing about 166 grams, far lighter than the bulky VR headsets of the era. The glasses used two 2.1-inch LCD panels at 1,600 by 1,600 pixels per eye (3,200 by 1,600 total) at roughly 1,058 pixels per inch, with a refresh rate of 90Hz in PC mode and 70Hz in mobile mode and an estimated 90-degree field of view. They offered only 3 degrees of freedom (3DoF) head tracking, paired with a 3DoF remote, and required tethering to a compatible Huawei smartphone or a PC for power and processing over USB-C. A notable feature was an adjustable-diopter optical system supporting 0 to 700 degrees of myopia correction per lens without separate prescription inserts. It launched in China for 2,999 yuan (about 425 US dollars) and did not reach Western markets.

Huawei VR Glass 6DoF (2020-2021)

At the 2020 World VR Industry Conference Cloud Summit, Huawei introduced the VR Glass 6DoF Game Set, an upgraded version aimed at gaming. It carried over the slim form factor and 1,600 by 1,600 per-eye resolution but added 6 degrees of freedom (inside-out) positional tracking, which Huawei said reached millimeter-level spatial accuracy, plus two 6DoF motion controllers fitted with 360-degree joysticks, side gesture buttons, and haptic feedback. The controllers could nest together so the headset stacked neatly on top of them for compact storage. The kit was made available to developers around the end of 2020 and went on public sale in China in April 2021. Like its predecessor, it was not released in Western markets.

Huawei Vision Glass (2022)

The Huawei Vision Glass shifted away from immersive VR toward a wearable personal display. Announced in November 2022, it opened for pre-order on December 9 and went on sale in China on December 26, 2022, for 2,999 yuan (about 431 US dollars). Rather than tracking head movement, it presents a fixed virtual screen of up to 120 inches and functions purely as an output device for smartphones, tablets, and PCs connected over USB-C. It uses two independent Micro-OLED displays at up to 1,920 by 1,080 pixels with up to 90 percent of the DCI-P3 color gamut and 480 nits of peak brightness, weighs about 112 grams, and supports up to 500 degrees of myopia adjustment per eye. Audio comes from an open acoustic design with dual ultra-thin speakers.

Smart audio glasses

Separately from its VR line, Huawei has produced Smart glasses focused on audio rather than displays, developed in partnership with the Korean eyewear brand Gentle Monster. The first-generation Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear was unveiled in March 2019 and built speakers and microphones into fashion frames, with charging handled through the case. Huawei announced the second-generation Eyewear II in 2021, adding touch-and-pinch controls on the temples, a dual semi-open directional speaker design, IP67 dust and water resistance, and a wireless charging case, with the company quoting up to about five hours of music playback per charge. These products contain no Augmented Reality display; their function is hands-free audio, calls, and voice-assistant access. Huawei has continued in the smart-glasses category since, including a later HUAWEI Eyewear 2 sunglasses model.

Product line

Product	Year	Type	Notable specs and notes
Huawei VR	2016	Mobile (slot-in) VR headset	Announced April 2016 at the P9 launch; phone slots into the viewer; touchpad control; promoted 360-degree sound; later Daydream support announced
Huawei VR 2	2018 (CES debut)	Tethered VR headset	3K LCD at 1,600x1,440 per eye, 90Hz; connects to phone, tablet, or PC over USB-C; demonstrated running Steam
Huawei VR Glass	2019	Phone/PC-tethered VR glasses (3DoF)	~166 g; 26.6 mm thick; dual 2.1-inch LCD at 1,600x1,600 per eye, ~1,058 ppi; 70/90Hz; ~90-degree FOV; 0-700-degree diopter adjustment; 2,999 yuan; China only
Huawei VR Glass 6DoF	2020 (announced), 2021 (sale)	Tethered VR gaming set (6DoF)	Adds inside-out 6DoF positional tracking and two 360-degree-joystick controllers with haptics; nesting controller storage; developer release end of 2020, public sale April 2021
Huawei Vision Glass	2022	Personal display glasses	Dual Micro-OLED, up to 1,920x1,080, 90% DCI-P3, 480 nits; 120-inch virtual screen; ~112 g; output-only over USB-C; 2,999 yuan
Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear	2019	Smart audio glasses	Speakers and microphones in fashion frames; case charging; no AR display
Huawei X Gentle Monster Eyewear II	2021	Smart audio glasses	Touch controls, directional dual speakers, IP67, ~5 hours playback, wireless charging case; no AR display

Technology

Huawei's VR hardware has emphasized compactness and screen quality over the bulkier all-in-one designs common when the products launched. The Huawei VR Glass used short-focus optics to reach a 26.6 mm lens-barrel thickness and a roughly 166 gram weight, and it built diopter correction directly into the lenses so wearers could dial in up to 700 degrees of myopia without prescription inserts. With the VR Glass 6DoF the company moved from 3DoF to camera-based inside-out 6DoF tracking, removing the need for external base stations. The later Huawei Vision Glass dropped head tracking entirely and adopted dual Micro-OLED panels to act as a wearable cinema screen, a design closer to display glasses than to a tracked VR headset. Across these devices Huawei kept the heavy processing off the headset, relying on a connected phone, tablet, or PC.

Market position

Huawei's VR and AR devices have been sold mainly in China and tied closely to its smartphone ecosystem, and the company has not pursued the global XR market as aggressively as some rivals. The original Huawei VR Glass and the VR Glass 6DoF were not released in Western markets, a situation widely linked to the US sanctions that constrained Huawei's access to certain technology and to overseas distribution from 2019 onward. Despite those constraints, Huawei remains one of the largest technology companies in the world by revenue, and its consumer hardware business, which includes its wearables and glasses, returned to strong growth in 2024.