New products and Services
Essilor® living intelligence™
Essilor® Varilux® introduces Essilor® living intelligence™ to Varilux® XR series™:
A new approach to lens design for a world where vision keeps evolving
Since 2023, when Varilux® XR series™ was first launched, the world has become more connected, hybrid, and visually demanding. Screen use has intensified, multitasking has become the norm, and daily life requires increasingly frequent shifts across distances and environments.
Additionally, Essilor® Varilux® noticed three major evolutions affecting visual behaviours:
- Working distance: objects are held closer than before, changing how near vision zones are used.
- Gaze lowering: the way people naturally lower and direct their gaze is changing in everyday situations.
- Frames shape: bigger frames are becoming trendy, impacting how lenses are worn and how the near vision zone is being placed within the lens.
To remain aligned with how people truly see today, lens design must evolve accordingly.
A design system that goes beyond AI alone
For years, artificial intelligence (AI) has enabled breakthrough innovations in lens design. Today, Essilor® takes this one step further – evolving its static AI model to a dynamic system: Essilor® Living Intelligence™.
Traditionally, predictive AI models used to design lenses are trained once and on a fixed dataset. As visual behaviours evolve, these models gradually become less representative of today’s wearers, a well-known phenomenon in AI known as model drift.
Essilor® Living Intelligence™ is a 4-step lens design process built to keep Varilux® XR Series™ aligned with real-life vision as it evolves1. It goes beyond AI alone, combining human insight with EssilorLuxottica’s R&D expertise to keep Varilux® XR Series™ aligned with how people truly see today, in a world that never stands still.
The 4 steps of Essilor® Living Intelligence™
1) Understand
Essilor® Living Intelligence™ captures millions of data points from multiple sources. This dataset is regularly enriched to become more robust and be representative of evolving visual behaviours.
2) Predict
Behavioural AI analyses large-scale real-world data to model how people use their eyes in everyday situations. Embedded in XR-motion™ technology, this enables more accurate design and positioning of the near vision zone by better predicting natural eye movements. Predictive models are regularly updated to sustain and improve accuracy over time – delivering greater predictive power as visual habits evolve.
3) Evolve
Digital Twin technology creates a virtual 3D replica of real-life visual behaviour, reproducing how wearers naturally use their eyes across a wide range of everyday situations*. Through simulations, it enables Essilor® Living Intelligence™ to validate, refine, and regularly improve Varilux® XR series™ before and alongside real-world validation.
4) Personalise
Varilux® XR series™ can be further refined through advanced personalisation options**, such as Near Vision Behaviour (NVB), FIT, and Eyecode®. These precise in-store measurement feed the Essilor® Living Intelligence™ data base, strengthening the accuracy of our predictive models.
A lens designed to stay relevant over time
By introducing Essilor® Living Intelligence™, Essilor® Varilux® opens a new chapter in progressive lens innovation – where design is no longer fixed at launch but regularly enriched to reflect real-life behaviours. This shift marks a fundamental evolution: from lenses designed once, to lenses designed as ever-evolving, to remain relevant in a constantly changing world.
As Visual behaviours evolve, so does Varilux® XR series™’ design. With Essilor® Living Intelligence™, Varilux® XR series™ is being adapted to better match how people see today and continues to deliver at its best performance over time1.
Ask the expert
Q&A with Cyril Guilloux, Optical Design Director at EssilorLuxottica
- What fundamentally differentiates Essilor® Living Intelligence™ from other artificial intelligence models used in lens design? How does Essilor® Living Intelligence™ enable a lens to remain relevant over time?
Artificial intelligence often relies on static design models, which can gradually lose relevance as visual behaviours evolve over time.
With Essilor® Living Intelligence™, we move beyond this limitation and work with a dynamic AI model. It refreshes its predictive model over time to maintain long-term relevance and precision.
Our system is built on an advanced behavioural dataset, capturing real-world vision through millions of data points. This dataset is regularly enriched, enabling the system to better understand and anticipate how the eyes naturally move across a wide range of everyday situations.
- What does “a lens that stays aligned with real-life vision” concretely mean for wearers and eye-care professionals?
For wearers, it means choosing a lens that is always up to date with how people actually see today – at the moment they purchase it. They benefit from a high level of visual performance in their daily lives, including instant sharpness even in motion, precise vision of details, seamless transitions from near to far, and fast adaptation from the very first day2.
For eye-care professionals, it means being able to recommend Varilux® XR series™ with lasting confidence. Thanks to Essilor® Living Intelligence™, the lens is designed to better match evolving visual behaviours and maintain a high level of performance over time – ensuring that their patients receive a solution that remains relevant.
- How should we understand this evolution for Varilux® XR series™, is it an enhancement or a transformation?
It goes beyond a simple enhancement. It is a product refinement, with regular updates, leading to significant change overtime.
It is a significant evolution that regularly refines the lens design to better reflect how people see today.
With Essilor® Living Intelligence™, Varilux® XR series™ integrates more recent and richer real-world behavioural data – including a 60% increase in dataset volume – combined with more advanced predictive models that better capture the complexity of visual behaviour.
This includes a more accurate understanding of how near vision varies depending on prescription, as well as improved modeling of key parameters such as working distance and gaze direction.
The tangible impact is a more precise positioning of the near vision zone within the lens, enabling a more natural visual experience in everyday situations for each wearer.
Ultimately, it is not a new product – but a smarter, more up-to-date version of Varilux® XR series™. Each release brings targeted refinements rather than a complete redesign. As Essilor® Living Intelligence™ continues to evolve with richer data and refreshed AI models, these successive refinements accumulate, leading to meaningful transformation over time while ensuring the product remains aligned with evolving visual behaviours helping Varilux® XR series™ continue to deliver its best performance as the world evolves.
