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Glarewear Eyewear review

Stuart Turton Read more October 7, 2009

£83

Price when reviewed

Imagine being able to use your laptop on a summer’s day, without the screen being rendered useless by the glare of the cursed sun. IT geeks with suntans – that’s the promise of the Glarewear sunglasses. Unfortunately, that promise turns out to be emptier than Jordan’s bookcase. They don’t work, or at least, they don’t work any better than a normal pair of polarising sunglasses.

It all starts off well enough; the glasses are delivered in a chunky case that screams Miami-beach holiday, and unzipping it you’re presented with three sets of lenses of varying tints that can be switched in and out depending on how bright the day is. It goes downhill shortly after that.

IT geeks with suntans – that’s the promise of the Glarewear sunglasses

The plastic frames are more Blackpool pier than Miami Vice, and while five out of the six lenses could be clicked into the frames without fuss, the sixth simply wouldn’t slot into place. We considered cracking out the Sellotape, but instead decided to hold it in place for the purposes of the test – earning some funny looks from the people watching us in the park.

Pitted against the direct glare of the sun they’re utterly useless, with objects on the laptop screen remaining as annoyingly indistinct as ever. Things improve slightly out of direct sunlight and though there’s no doubt the lenses make it easier to see the screen, so do my £5 sunglasses bought off a pile in Primark. If the Glarewear sunglasses were priced at around £10 or £15 we’d be feeling far more cheerful about them, but priced at £72 they’d need to come with a laptop built-in to earn a recommendation.