Swimming in Glasses Is Terrible. These Prescription Goggles Are Far Better. | Reviews by Wirecutter

By Annemarie Conte

Annemarie Conte is an editor who writes the Ask Wirecutter column and trending-product reviews. She’d love to make you a friendship bracelet.

I’ve spent most of my adult life swimming in glasses. It’s terrible.

My contact-lens-wearing days ended with an eye infection in college, and my significant nearsightedness means that I can’t function well without my glasses. So my only choices have been to take them off and blindly jump into the water, or to keep them on the whole time, which is inconvenient and nerve-racking.

If you think I’m being dramatic, please consider that my -7 prescription is so strong, my clear-eyed co-counselors at summer camp used to borrow my glasses, put them on, and stumble around, calling them “drunk girl glasses.”

I’ve spent decades breast-stroking on the surface like a grandma who doesn’t want to get her hair wet, unable to dive or swim underwater, to avoid losing my glasses.

All of that changed when I discovered prescription swim goggles in 2021. I had never even considered them as an option, but after hearing about them through a parenting Facebook group, I ordered a pair for myself. I put them on and was immediately able to walk to (and jump into) the water without tripping or stumbling. I no longer had to worry about bumping into another swimmer in the lap lane, and I could finally glide underwater and pretend to be a sea creature tickling my kid’s toes.

I want to shout it from the high dive: You too can have inexpensive prescription swim goggles, and they can change your life!

Unfortunately, my original pair is no longer sold, but I tested a few more to find a new favorite. In the end, it was the off-the-shelf cheapies that won the day.

Inexpensive, with a wide range of myopic prescriptions, these goggles give you clear vision in and out of the water and don’t readily fog up. But the mirrored lenses will smudge.

I’d always assumed prescription swim goggles needed to be special-ordered from an optician (which you absolutely can do). But they can also be more akin to reading glasses—you just purchase the strength that is closest to your prescription right off the rack, without proving your prescription. If you’re unsure if prescription swim goggles are right for you, check with your optometrist.

To buy prescription swim goggles, you just need to know your sphere number, which is clearly indicated on your prescription. The number either has a minus sign if you’re nearsighted or a plus sign if you’re farsighted.

If your eyes are two different strengths, you can buy two pairs and swap in the right combo of lenses.

I want to shout it from the high dive: You too can have inexpensive prescription swim goggles, and they can change your life!

If you want an exact prescription match, you can order through an optician or some online glasses outlets by uploading your prescription—though an optician may be more expensive. “For those with astigmatism or more complex prescriptions, optometrists may recommend goggles that are customized for your exact prescription needs,” said Dr. Ronald Benner, former president of the American Optometric Association. Because these goggles are custom-tailored to you, no modifications would be needed if your eyes are two different strengths.

For this article, I only tested nearsighted goggles. Far-sighted goggles are available but typically in more limited quantities.

I still have the off-the-rack pair I bought for $15.98 on Amazon; they’re comfortable and easy to adjust, and they’ve held up over the past few years. But they’re made by one of those Amazon-exclusive, made-in-China, alphabet-soup-named brands, and they’re no longer available (which is one of the downsides of buying from these types of brands).

This time, I chose three pairs to test to see if they could keep up with my original, game-changing goggles. I bought a pair of each goggles in my prescription, and I tested them in a lake, a pool, and the shower (for funsies) using similar criteria to what staff writer Seth Berkman did when testing for our kids and adults swim goggles guide, focusing on clarity, comfort, durability, and ease of adjustment.

As Seth explains in the guide, goggle lens colors have different functions: “Most goggle lenses come in different colors and tints for different swimming setups. For example, clear and light-blue lenses are the best for indoor swimming. Blue lenses allow for better visibility in the open water. Gray-tinted lenses, on the other hand, are best for sunny, outdoor conditions. Yellow, orange, and amber-tinted lenses are good for low-light conditions.”

With specialty prescription goggles, options are more limited, so I chose what was available from each brand.

The Speedo Vanquisher 2.0 goggles, a pair our testers liked in our guide, come in a similarly priced prescription version, the Speedo Vanquisher 2.0 Optical Prescription Goggles.

I also got a pair from GlassesUSA, an online prescription eyewear company we tested for our guide to buying glasses online. Our glasses testers didn’t make them a pick partially because the experience “was sullied … by fluctuating prices, coupon landmines, and upsells upon upsells.” I understood this caveat (and experienced it firsthand), but felt that having a retailer that could reliably make the correct prescription could be worth the marketing attack trade-off. The unsubscribe button is a blessing.

For the third pair I tested, I ordered from a brand sold on Amazon called Wave that sells prescription goggles, snorkeling masks, fins, and other water accessories.

We made sure that all three goggles offered UV protection, with outdoor summer swimming in mind. “Goggles that have been specifically marked to protect eyes from 100 percent of the sun’s UV rays can help prevent the sharp rays of the sun from causing damage to your eyes,” said Benner.

(As an aside, if you are sitting near the water watching others swim, Benner recommends wearing UV-blocking sunglasses to prevent glare and irritation from the direct sunlight as well as the reflected light off the water. Polarized sunglasses are ideal.)

The Speedo and Wave goggles both come with UV protection, and GlassesUSA offers the feature at a roughly $39 markup.

All three pairs I tested gave me clear enough vision for swimming and walking around between swims, though none of them are practical for long stints out of the water. You can’t really go wrong with any of them, and what matters most is making sure you have the right strength and fit in whatever pair you use. Of the three, the Wave pair felt like the best balance of price, comfort, and efficiency.

Inexpensive, with a wide range of myopic prescriptions, these goggles give you clear vision in and out of the water and don’t readily fog up. But the mirrored lenses will smudge.

The Wave Prescription Nearsighted Swim Goggles are available in multiple colors via Amazon and through the company’s website. They come in strengths from -1.5 to -10, including some half-steps, and are built with luxe, squishy eyepieces, an easy to change nosepiece, and standard adjustable straps that didn’t give me any issues.

Once I jumped into the pool for a lap swim, I was impressed that they provided me with clear vision and didn’t fog, although I did experience light fogging during a particularly long evening lake swim. They also struck the perfect Goldilocks moment of being tight-enough that they didn’t leak but not so tight that they hurt. The nosepiece easily snaps in and out but stays secure once it’s in place.

However, the customer service address is a Gmail address, and some of the text on the Wave website reads like a poor translation or AI-generated writing. We haven’t tested its direct customer service because we ordered through Amazon.

The Wave goggles only come in mirrored lenses, and I didn’t like how easily they smudge, especially if your hands are a little greasy from sunblock, but overall these are the goggles I will continue to grab for any future water activities.

These goggles are specially made to your specific prescription, come with a soft-sided case and a 365-day warranty, and give perfect vision, but they fogged up more frequently than the other models I tried.

When I took the Progear HSV-1302 Swimming Goggles out of the box and put them on, I experienced that new-glasses adjustment of wonky vision for a minute or two. But I was quickly able to see both above and below water with real clarity.

Because the lenses are actual prescription lenses, they tend to look slightly more bug-eyed than the others I tested. Still, they were easy to adjust and comfortable to wear.

The frames come in three colors and have an included soft case. At first, I was confused as to why the box didn’t include nosepieces in different sizes, which is a fairly standard adjustment with goggles. I suspected this is because the lenses are set to my specific prescription, including pupillary distance (PD)—the measurement of the distance between the center of each of your pupils. Adjusting the nosepiece would shift that PD and impact your vision.

When I contacted customer service to confirm this, I was routed through a hellish phone tree until I decided to use the chat function. After repeatedly requesting a live person rather than the bot, I was finally connected to a customer service representative who said I was correct.

While customer service was a little taxing, ordering the goggles was easy. I just added them to my cart and uploaded my prescription. GlassesUSA took 10 days to create and deliver my order. They told me my prescription would take six days to produce, and we paid an extra $12.95 for three- to five-day express shipping. If you need goggles quickly, this isn’t the best option.

While the $128 price is high, they seem to have perma-sales, with discount codes rotating frequently. I often saw the goggles listed around $78 with coupon codes. However, you have to pay a $39 upcharge for UV coating, and additional upgrades are available, like thinner lenses or tinting (which, in retrospect, I wish I had opted for). They come with GlassesUSA’s 365-day manufacturer’s warranty, which covers both lenses and frames, though the site is a bit vague on the details of exactly what that covers.

Even with less surface area around the eyes, these goggles keep out water most of the time and adjust with few problems. They come in a prescription range of -1.5 through -8.

The Speedo Vanquisher 2.0 Optical Prescription Goggles are the prescription version of one of Wirecutter’s favorite goggles, and the prescription version is only slightly more expensive than the regular goggles. They come in three lens styles: clear, mirrored, and smoke.

These Speedo goggles range in strength from -1.5 to -8 and are available at a variety of online retailers, including Amazon, Speedo, and others. I agreed with the handful of our testers who said they felt uncomfortable, as they pinched my nose on both sides. Replacing the nose bridge was challenging, as our testers and some commenters point out on the pair’s Amazon page. They also didn’t come with any protective case.

Because they are billed as competitive racing goggles, they are designed for performance rather than comfort. The eyepieces are less squishy than the others, but they are lightweight, don’t leak, and aren’t prone to fogging. The back straps are easy to adjust as well.

If you’re looking for racing-style goggles, which tend to be less comfortable than other styles, this could work for you.

As with any vision correction, it’s best to not guess your prescription. Anything off can make your eyes work harder and can cause blurry vision, eye strain, headaches and more, according to Benner. If your prescription changes, it’s a good idea to purchase new goggles.

In terms of maintenance, just rinse after each use to remove sand, debris, and chlorine and wipe them down with a lens cloth so you can keep the lenses scratch free and any special coatings intact.

It’s best to keep your goggles out of the sun (to help prevent the silicone parts from deteriorating) and in a protective case when not in use. I like the Croakies Sunglasses Case with Carabiner because it is roomy, zippers shut, and can be clipped to a bag for easy transport.

This hard-sided case zips closed to keep glasses protected. You can use the convenient carabiner to clip the case to your bag for easy access.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. If you have gotten this far and you are still unsure, I will say it once more: Prescription goggles gave me back the freedom and flexibility to have some fun in the water. I truly feel like I have my summers back.

This article was edited by Alexander Aciman and Catherine Kast.

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Annemarie Conte

Deputy Editor

Annemarie Conte is a deputy editor at Wirecutter. She has written and edited for multiple local and national magazines throughout her career. You can follow her on Instagram.