Oracle Unveiled The World's First Lensless LED Headlights, And Tacoma Owners Get Them First
Toyota Tacoma owners with $800-$900 to spare and a desire to have the latest and greatest on their trucks will soon be able to invest in what's actually a pretty cool innovation from Oracle Lighting. The specialist company has created what it says are the first "lensless" headlights.
From the Oracle announcement, authored by founder Justin Hartenstein:
Our new lensless LED headlight eliminates the lens entirely, removing the most failure-prone element of the system. No more fogging. No more cracking. No more yellowing or hazing. No more lens oxidation. No more moisture behind your lens. This is a design built for durability, performance, and innovation from the inside out.
Oracle unveiled the technology at this year's SEMA show, according to CarScoops. Oracle Lighting calls the design "cutting edge" and highlights the use of "Bi-LES" emitter pods that have strong protection against dust and water ingress, as well as thermal management (factors that will appeal to off roaders). The elements can also be easily replaced one at a time – you no longer have to install a whole new headlight if a single LED unit conks out, and you don't have to remove the headlight assembly from the vehicle.
Customization options
Oracle says that the headlight's housing can be matched to a vehicle's paint color, opening up some tasty customization possibilities. A new bracket design also makes for easier maintenance and component shipping, the company claims. High beams, low beams, and daytime running lights can all be swapped out and either serviced or fully replaced.
You can easily see the value here, especially if you take your Toyota Taco into challenging territory and expose the headlights to rocks, mud, dirt, sand, stray branches, and the other slings and arrows of serious offroading. Just eliminating lenses that are prone to getting busted might be worth the price. Later on in the life of a vehicle, hazing and yellowing of the lenses are annoying issues that can prompt owners to go for expensive new headlights. As for how robust these headlights might be, Oracle sounds pretty convinced of the durability of their exposed pods and says they spent years developing the design.
Beyond the Tacoma
The headlights will go on sale officially early next year. The third-generation Tacoma is the chosen launch vehicle, and that makes good business sense, given that there are a lot of them out there and they are popular with pickup owners who abuse their trucks for fun (the fourth-gen Taco arrived for the 2024 model year). Headlight units that fit the Toyota 4Runner and Ford F-150, as well as other vehicles, are on the way, Oracle says. The company has unveiled this design with no shortage of confidence, so it will be interesting to see how the lights perform when they're exposed to the exceptionally tough, lens-cracking conditions they were evidently designed for. Last year, Oracle celebrated its 25th anniversary as a successful aftermarket supplier, and the company touts a legacy of innovation, so let's give them the benefit of the doubt. The lensless headlights definitely address a need, particularly for the offroading community, and from the images we've seen, they look rather sharp.
