While its name might point to a mostly-abandoned push into the metaverse, Meta’s found itself in the midst of a wearable revolution, thanks to both its smart glasses partnership with Ray-Ban and, of course, the Quest lineup of VR headsets. Now, several years after initially cancelling its first-ever smartwatch, Meta might be looking to give wrist-based gadgets another go.

According to a report from DigiTimes, Meta has a revival in store for the smartwatch project it canned back in 2022 (via @Jukalosreve). Unlike most other smartwatches from brands like Samsung and Google, Meta’s wearable is allegedly designed to compliment both its smart glasses and its Quest headsets, focusing primarily on examining the world around you through built-in cameras rather than focusing on health tracking and incoming notifications.

In fact, whatever Meta has in the works here sounds pretty similar to what the company was cooking up back in 2021. At the time, reports suggested Meta — or Facebook, as it was still known — planned to launch a pair of smartwatches in the summer of 2022, utilizing a pair of cameras to differentiate itself from the rest of the market. Leaks suggested a 12MP main sensor located on the bottom of the device, thus requiring the user take the watch off, while the 5MP “front-facing” camera was meant for wrist-based video calls. Remember, this was in the era of Facebook’s long-forgotten Portal smart display, when the brand was all-in on video conferencing.

While you might expect Meta to have reconsidered its initial idea for a smartwatch in the years since, it sounds like this revived project isn’t all too dissimilar to its predecessor. DigiTimes suggests this wearable, which restarted development in early 2024, is a play at “enhancing the metaverse experience” — whatever that means — thanks to at least one built-in camera. Presumably, the company’s current focus on AI and its large language models will also play a role here, especially considering the company planned to launch “half a dozen” AI wearables this year.

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Regardless of what Meta’s finalized smartwatches actually look like, we might not have to wait that long to find out. Meta Connect, the company’s annual developer conference, is set to kick off on September 17th, and according to this report, this year’s event could include a look at this revived project.