One luxury item many gym climbers and rock climbers may be familiar with is belay glasses. Belay glasses are a small item which can make a big difference in how you feel at the end of your climbing session – especially if you or your partner like climbing steep, overhanging routes.
What Are Belay Glasses?
Belay glasses are essentially small mirrors, or prisms, attached to a glasses frame. They direct the wearer’s gaze upwards, instead of forwards. This allows a climbing belayer to stare forward, instead of craning their neck up to see their climber. The basic principle is demonstrated in the prism diagram above.
Who Are Belay Glasses For?
Belay glasses are for everyone, although younger climbers may not see the need for them. The main purpose of these climbing glasses is to reduce ergonomic neck strain. The human neck isn’t designed to spend hours at a time starting upwards, and as many of our readers may understand, spending hours doing this at a time might leave you with a sore neck. Over a lifetime of climbing, neck, shoulder, and posture problems may develop. Using belay glasses will help you feel fresher at the end of your climbing session, as well as help you stay healthier, longer.
Eyeglass wearers will find belay glasses slightly awkward to use, although it *is* still possible. Specialized clip-on belay glasses may be a better choice for these people, such as the models sold by Y&Y or CU Belay Glasses.
What Are The Disadvantages of Belay Glasses?
They look a little goofy, and some people find them disorienting.
Most users will experience a five to ten minute adjustment period, where the mirror image will cause them to feel a little odd, or possibly slightly sick. Usually, your brain can adjust to focus only on the mirror image, and these symptoms will go away. For certain people, however, these sensations linger, making belay glasses impractical to use. We recommend you give them a solid thirty minutes or so of use before writing them off – some adjustment period is normal.
If using the clip-on kind for eyeglasses, the disadvantage is that you won’t be able to share them with climbers who do not use prescription eyeglasses.
Which Are The Best Belay Glasses?
The best belay glasses are the ones you have with you while belaying someone on their steep proj. Besides that, the differences are going to be fairly minimal.
For better or worse, the prices for climbing belay glasses have come way down due to the widespread availability of made-in-China knockoffs. Where the original CU or Y&Y belay glasses used to cost over a hundred dollars, these days you can buy a pair of belay glasses on Amazon for around $20.
If you prefer to buy from a name brand, Y&Y makes a nice metal frame. Metolius offers made-in-USA belay glasses, and the company has a reputation for stellar customer service, if you ever have any issues. Otherwise, it’s hard to beat a bargain, and the BG belay glasses cost $30, and have a 4.8/5 with over 2,000 ratings on Amazon.
Overall
We recommend belay glasses to every serious climber, based on our own sore necks and slouched postures. They’re not a necessity, but certainly a nice quality-of-life improvement, especially for those who do any type of steep, project-oriented single-pitch climbing.
Gym to Crag 