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Liz Baker, who has macular degeneration, uses the eSight Go to read text. Credit: Beth Skwarecki

Key Takeaways

1. eSight Go is made for people with central vision loss, which includes macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy.
2. I met a user who is legally blind but can read text and see faces clearly with these glasses.
3. The device costs $4,950 and is not covered by most insurance.

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“Smart” glasses have been big at CES this year, but the headset that has impressed me most is a device that helps people with central vision loss, including those who are considered “legally blind,” to see what they otherwise couldn’t. At a press event, I met a woman with macular degeneration, Liz Baker, who uses them daily—and I got to try them myself.

What eSight Go is, and how it works

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

The device is called eSight Go. It’s a headset with little screens in front of your eyes, sort of like a VR headset, but small enough to perch on your nose. The device’s battery pack sits around the back of your neck, so that you don’t have to support the weight of the battery on your head. The glasses are bulky, but the battery pack design made them comfortable for me to wear.

The device is designed for people with central vision loss, which includes conditions like macular degeneration. In these conditions, the middle of the person’s visual field isn’t clear—things they look directly at appear blurry or simply aren’t visible, but their peripheral vision is still clear.

Regular eyewear can’t correct this issue, since the information in the center of the visual field just isn’t there. But the eSight device works by zooming in so much that the person’s peripheral vision is able to process what they’re seeing, and that central “blind spot” essentially disappears. The company’s studies show that people gain seven lines of improvement on vision charts—that’s huge.

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It’s hard for me, as a sighted person, to know exactly what that’s like, but Baker gave me a few examples. With the device, she can read ingredient labels and see people’s facial features; without it, those things are literally a blur. She told me about noticing her daughter’s freckles when looking through the eSight device, and using it to shop without help. (Previously, small text at stores was impossible to read; she says she kept buying shampoo when she meant to buy conditioner.)

Practical use

The battery pack, left, sits over your shoulders and attaches to the headset with a short cable. Credit: Beth Skwarecki

The device has a dizzying array of features that I wasn’t able to master in my short time with it. To name a few: You can zoom in and out with buttons on the arm of the headset, or with a handheld remote. You can increase the contrast of whatever you’re looking at. You can freeze-frame, zoom in, and then move your head to read the enlarged image as if it were a giant billboard in front of you (even if it’s something small or far away, like a brochure in your hand or a menu on a restaurant wall.)

The device costs $4,950 and is not covered by most insurance. It comes with access to a “coach” who is themselves an eSight user with vision loss who can talk new users through learning the features or helping them to figure out how to do specific tasks.

What do you think so far?

The battery life on the eSight Go is about four hours, so I asked Baker how she keeps the device charged throughout the day. She says she doesn’t wear the glasses continuously, which saves battery life. She keeps them around her neck (essentially in a sleep mode) when she isn’t actively using them to read text or look at a specific thing in detail.

Director of sales Roland Mattern says people who test the glasses sometimes zoom all the way in and note that the image can be pixelated, but most users don’t need the max zoom level, and those who do tend to find that it’s still an improvement over what they can see without the glasses.

The hefty price isn’t usually covered by insurance, although the Department of Veterans Affairs will cover it, and Mattern says a few users with other insurance companies have sometimes managed to get coverage. Sometimes other programs can cover it, like state-run vocational rehabilitation programs that help people with disabilities return to work.