Ireland and rest of Europe can now ‘Snap’ up Spectacles online

2 Jun 2017

Image: Screenshot from Spectacles.com

Snap’s Spectacles have progressed from a novelty to a hugely popular wearable in a matter of months, and now they are available in Europe.

Despite the fact that Snap appears to be moving into the world of drones in a bid to bolster the power of Snapchat, the company’s current wearable, Spectacles, is still going down a treat Stateside.

Launched in September of last year, Spectacles are a relatively simple – and somewhat stylish – pair of Bluetooth-connected glasses that allow the user to take pictures and videos for the Snapchat app.

At that time, it was part of a marketing campaign and they could only be bought through special vending machines but, since February of this year, they have been available in the US online.

Now, Snapchat fans in Ireland and the rest of Europe can get their hands on them for the first time through the Spectacles website.

According to TechCrunch, the Spectacles cost €149.99 (£129.99) and are being made available in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Spain, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Sweden and the UK.

Snap is sticking with its marketing ploy of putting vending machines in some of Europe’s biggest cities, including London, Paris, Berlin, Barcelona and Venice.

They won’t be hanging around, though, as the company plans to make the most out of them during the summer months, moving around to various locations in the countries of France, Germany, Spain, Italy and the UK.

It marks another milestone for Snap, which had its first IPO early last month with a valuation of $24bn.

At that time, the company reported that daily active users grew from 122m in the first quarter of 2016 to 166m in Q1 2017, which is a 36pc increase on last year. Snap also said that daily active users increased 5pc from 158m in Q4 2016.

Colm Gorey was a senior journalist with Silicon Republic

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