Meta made a Tamagotchi-like wearable for its Muse AI agent

Meta has unveiled Muse Charm, a palm-sized wearable designed to give its Muse AI agent a physical home. CEO Mark Zuckerberg showed the device on Wednesday at the company's annual Connect event, in a "one more thing" moment at the end of the keynote.

A charm for the Muse agent

The Muse agent, embodied by a digital avatar known inside the company as Jolly, lives inside the little companion, which owners can carry in a pocket or attach to a keychain. A small screen displays the avatar, while a fingerprint sensor in the corner lets people start talking without unlocking a phone or opening an app.

"We packed the whole Muse experience, including the whole real-time voice and avatar stack, into something that fits on a keychain and is always available to talk to," Zuckerberg said during the keynote. "If you're not wearing glasses, this is going to be by far the fastest way to talk to your Muse and to show what's going on around you."

Shipping in time for the holidays

The device is not ready to ship just yet. Zuckerberg said his team still has to "finalize laying out the components," and promised the charms would be "ready to ship in time for the holidays in December."

Why it matters

Muse Charm has a quasi-Tamagotchi feel: a lightweight, personality-filled device meant to keep users connected to Meta's software. It arrives after a wave of AI amulets such as Friend, which drew eye-rolling from part of the consumer market. For Meta, it is a relatively low-stakes experiment with AI wearables, and one more way to push its already popular agent out to the masses.