Nreal prepares new Xreal brand following Epic settlement

Chinese AR glasses maker Nreal appears to be getting ready to rebrand itself as Xreal, and will use that new brand to introduce a new compute unit for its Air AR glasses. The rebranding follows a trademark dispute with Epic Games, which got settled out of court last year. An Nreal spokesperson declined to comment.

Epic had sued Nreal and its parent company in 2021, alleging that the Nreal brand infringed on the trademark for its Unreal game engine. The two companies settled their differences in April of 2022, and the lawsuit was ultimately dismissed with prejudice last August. While the terms of the settlement were confidential, it now appears that Nreal is getting ready to rebrand as Xreal as a result of or at least following the agreement.

• Nreal first filed for a trademark for Xreal in late 2021, with a logo featuring the same font it had been using for its own brand. It followed up with a similar filing late last year.

• In March of this year, Nreal filed another trademark for Xreal, this time using a different, less playful font.

• In late April, a filing for a new hardware product called the “Xreal Beam” passed the FCC. Photos included in the filing show an external compute unit prominently featuring the Xreal brand with the new font as well as a product label using the same name.

• Nreal also recently began working on the Xreal.com website, but hasn’t launched it publicly yet.

• Finally, Amazon Germany began listing an iPhone adapter for the Nreal Air glasses as an “Xreal Air Adapter” this week.

Now, about that Xreal Beam device. The Xreal Beam that was mentioned in the April FCC filing appears to be a successor to the Nreal Streaming Box. The Streaming Box was supposed to make Nreal’s Air AR glasses compatible with a wider range of phones, but it was never widely released.

The new device will also work with game consoles and possible feature some built-in apps, according to a company-affiliated Reddit account. However, my understanding is that the device, which is code-named “Eva,” still requires a phone or game console to function properly.

Update: This post was updated at 9:35am PT with additional details on the Xreal Beam and the timeline of the rebranding.

Image courtesy of Nreal.