Snap just announced some of its most ambitious updates yet. At their developer event, Lens Fest 2025, CTO Bobby Murphy marked ten years of AR innovation with a simple message: Snap’s future belongs to its developers.
A Platform Built on People
What started as a playground for dog filters has grown into one of the world’s largest AR ecosystems. More than 400,000 creators have built over four million Lenses, reaching nearly a billion Snapchatters every month. But Snap’s ambitions have shifted. Their latest updates touch every layer of the stack – creation, monetization, infrastructure, and hardware.
Snap CTO, Bobby Murphy:
Our goal at Snap is to be the most developer friendly platform in the world. […] We want to make our platform the launchpad for your ideas.
Lens Studio Grows Up – With AI in the Driver’s Seat
Snapchat Lenses are augmented reality (AR) filters that let users transform their faces or surroundings in real time using special effects, animations, and interactive 3D elements. The centerpiece of the update is Lens Studio AI, a conversational creation tool that lets developers simply describe what they want – and Snap builds it. It writes code, generates assets, even assembles full Lenses, meaning the barrier to entry for AR creation just dropped through the floor.
Add Blocks, Snap’s new modular system for reusable scripts and effects, and you’ve got the beginnings of a true AR dev platform. The potential application for agencies and XR studios is huge. They can now prototype faster, iterate cheaper, and deploy everywhere – all within Snap’s ecosystem.
Spectacles 2026
Snap isn’t just building tools – it’s building an entirely new platform. With SnapOS 2.0 launching alongside its 2026 Spectacles, the glasses will finally run natively rather than as accessories to your phone. That means a Spectacles Browser, built-in WebXR support, and an OS purpose-built for spatial computing.
In effect, Snap is trying to turn Spectacles into the iOS of AR – where the OS isn’t just a shell, but a developer’s canvas.
The question, of course: will creators and enterprises see enough upside to bet on Snap’s hardware when Apple, Meta, and Samsung are already muscling in?
Monetization Meets the Creator Economy
Snap’s new Lens+ Payouts program expands on its creator rewards, letting Lens makers earn from paying subscribers. It’s a move that turns casual creators into small businesses.
This could be the start of a freemium XR economy: brands, agencies, and creators co-developing, deploying, and monetizing experiences together.
Snap CTO, Bobby Murphy:
When you make money, grow your audience, and build a career – our whole community succeeds.
Snapping at Their Competitor’s Heels
Zooming out, Snap’s evolution mirrors the broader XR industry shift from flashy demos to sustainable ecosystems. Meta is focusing on everyday AR wearables, whilst Apple is betting on premium design and a top-down hardware-first strategy.
Snap, by contrast, is carving out a middle lane – consumer-first, creator-driven, and powered by open tools. Its bet isn’t on owning the hardware stack, but on becoming the connective tissue that links developers, brands, and audiences across the spatial web.
In an industry obsessed with devices, Snap is reminding everyone that platforms (and the people who build on them) still matter most.
