Runner Turns Glasses Into Personal Dashcam

A runner who started tracking vehicle crossings with smart glasses said the camera begins recording in under a second.

Nick took up running this summer and said they sometimes speed up to avoid being hit by a car, including at crosswalks. Holding a phone while running was not workable, and an armband holster would not release the device fast enough to capture an incident. Nick already wore Meta glasses on runs to shoot short clips for Strava with smartwatch health data overlaid on the video.

Nick wears a Meta Nova pair and an Oakley Meta HSTN pair on runs. When a car approaches, they press the camera button to start recording and press it again after crossing the street to stop. Recordings run in 3-minute segments and remain on the glasses until they reconnect to a phone, at which point footage syncs automatically. Nick said starting capture takes less than a second and called the setup about as effortless as it gets.

Nick said they would be unlikely to buy a pair without a camera and acknowledged some negativity around cameras in glasses, while saying there are too many good reasons to have one available. For runners who want to try the approach, Nick suggests the Oakley Meta HSTN for its tight fit and runner-like style, and said cheaper Meta-branded pairs are the budget option since there is no functional difference among Meta's latest models. Nick named Rokid AI Glasses as the best alternative they have used for anyone wanting to avoid Meta.

Nick published the account on 2026-10-23.