Last year I purchased 10 pairs of safety glasses. The Ztek scored in the top 3 in every category I tested for. Style (for looking cool): #1: Smith and Wesson Phantom #2: Gateway Safety Flight #3: Pyramex Safety Ztek Feel (for wearing all day): #1: Uvex Protege #2: Uvex Sperian A800 #3: Pyramex Safety Ztek #4: MCR Safety Rubicon Headphones test (over ear but not noise canceling!): #1: Pyramex Ztek #2: MCR Safety Rubicon Overall ranking: #1: Uvex Sperian A800 #2: Pyramex Ztek #3: Uvex Protege #4: Smith & Wesson Phantom But how? How could the cheapest, simplest glasses perform so well? Well, they fit my face like a glove. Every curve, swoop, and bend perfectly mirrors the front of my face, leaving exactly 3mm of spacing between my face and the glasses... at every point. The glasses curve up and around the cheek bones instead of just trying to go in front of them. They curve down to cover the nose, where large gaps normally exist. These have become my driving glasses, I can cruise at 35 mph without the slightest hint of wind in my eyes. And of course that means it has excellent shrapnel protection as well. The nose bridge is unibody molded plastic, which is great. Rubber nose brides are difficult to get right. Some manufacturers skimp out and make them too small, others rely on them to hold the glasses in place. They are commonly sweat magnets. Every pair of glasses I've ever worn without rubber nose pads, the Ztek included, have proven that they are totally unnecessary. Besides, molding the front from a single piece of plastic gives the Ztek significant style points. They're the proper height-to-width ratio, but the clear variant turn practically invisible when worn. Yes of course they are still reflective, but the point is that there's no ugly black nose bridge to break up the flow. The rubber on the arms are far enough back to blend in with your hair. Oh yeah, the arms are great, to! they're thin and match the coloration of the lenses, and have a grainy texture that swoops into the front (not into your field of view, of course.) The ends are rubber tubes. They can be pulled off, but they're glued in place so don't do that. Very flexible, and they do a good job of keeping the glasses on your head. They crushed my headphones test, where I listened to my favorite album and tried to see if I could notice a difference. The only notes I wrote down for the Ztek was "perfect". They will not provide an air-tight seal, so they will not be good for noise-reduction headphones, (no glasses will) but they don't get in the way of your sound. Final thoughts: while Pyramex didn't attempt to revolutionize anything in the Ztek, they clearly spent a lot of time and effort getting the most basic design into what may be its most perfect form. I did rank Sperian A800 series higher overall, but the Ztek were cheaper when I got them and now the A800 aren't even being sold individually on Amazon. Anti-fog note: my anti-fog testing (wearing a covid mask and walking around on a cold night) was too intense for even the best anti-fog protection. I do not have good data to rank the glasses.
