When launching a private label sunglasses collection, brands often spend 90% of their design energy on the frames—selecting the perfect acetate colors, tweaking the CAD shapes, or testing titanium hinges. However, the lenses are what your customers actually look through.
Choosing the wrong lens material can compromise your brand’s reputation. A cheap lens can cause optical distortion (leading to headaches), scratch within a week of use, or crack under pressure. Conversely, over-specifying high-end lenses for a budget sunglasses line can destroy your profit margins.
For premium eyewear brands and optical retailers, understanding the differences between CR-39 (organic plastic), Nylon (polyamide), and Polycarbonate (PC) lenses is essential for optimizing product quality and manufacturing costs.
As a professional OEM/ODM eyewear manufacturer, we provide an in-depth breakdown of these three dominant sunglass lens materials.
1. CR-39: The Gold Standard for Optical Clarity
CR-39, short for “Columbia Resin 39”, is a thermosetting plastic developed in the 1940s. It has long been the optical industry standard for prescription lenses and fashion sunglasses.
The Pros:
- Superb Optical Quality: CR-39 has an Abbe value of 58 (close to crown glass, which is 59). This means it has incredibly low chromatic aberration, providing crisp, distortion-free vision.
- Excellent Scratch Resistance: Naturally harder than polycarbonate, CR-39 is highly resistant to daily wear and tear even without a hard coating (though a hard coat is always recommended for premium products).
- Tinting Versatility: Because it is a thermosetting resin, CR-39 easily absorbs organic dyes. This makes it the absolute best choice for custom fashion tints, high-precision gradients, and unique brand-specific colorways.
- Chemical Resistance: Unlike polycarbonate, CR-39 does not react easily with solvents, hairsprays, or alcohol-based cleaners.
The Cons:
- Fragility: CR-39 is relatively brittle compared to Nylon and Polycarbonate. It can chip or shatter under high-velocity impact, making it unsuitable for sports eyewear.
- Processing Limitations: Due to its brittleness, it is not recommended for rimless or semi-rimless frames where holes must be drilled directly into the lens (as it will crack around the drill points).
- Weight & Thickness: It is slightly heavier and thicker than polycarbonate and nylon.
2. Polycarbonate (PC): Lightweight and Shatterproof
Polycarbonate is a thermoplastic polymer widely used in industrial, sports, and budget-to-mid-range fashion eyewear.
The Pros:
- Extreme Impact Resistance: Polycarbonate is virtually unbreakable. It is the material of choice for safety goggles, children’s eyewear, and active sports sunglasses because it can withstand high impact without shattering.
- Ultra-Lightweight & Thin: Polycarbonate has a high refractive index (1.59) and low density, making it up to 20% thinner and 30% lighter than standard CR-39.
- Inherent UV Protection: Polycarbonate blocks 100% of UVA and UVB rays natively, without requiring special UV-blocking coatings.
- Low Cost: It is the most economical lens material to produce in high volumes, making it ideal for budget-friendly fashion collections.
The Cons:
- Low Abbe Value (Optical Distortion): Polycarbonate has an Abbe value of 30, the lowest of the three materials. Wearers may experience minor peripheral distortion and rainbow-like color fringing, especially in high-curve wraparound frames.
- Easily Scratched: PC is a soft thermoplastic. Without a high-quality anti-scratch hard coat (HC), it will scratch very easily.
- Poor Stress-Crack Resistance: If used in rimless or semi-rimless frame styles, the pressure around the screws or drill holes will eventually cause micro-cracks (crazing) to develop.
3. Nylon (Polyamide): The Premium Choice for High-End Designer Brands
Nylon, chemically known as polyamide, represents the cutting edge of sunglass lens technology. It combines the optical clarity of CR-39 with the durability of polycarbonate. Many luxury designer brands (such as Chanel, Prada, and high-performance brands like Oakley) specify nylon lenses for their collections.
The Pros:
- Outstanding Optical Clarity: With an Abbe value of 52, nylon provides exceptional visual acuity, vastly superior to polycarbonate and very close to CR-39.
- Superb Impact & Crack Resistance: Nylon is highly flexible and shatterproof. It has excellent tensile strength and stress-crack resistance, making it the ideal material for rimless, semi-rimless, and shield-style sunglasses.
- Ultra-Lightweight: Nylon has the lowest density (approx. 1.01 g/cm³) of all optical plastics, meaning it produces the lightest possible sunglasses for maximum wearer comfort.
- Environmentally Friendly Options: Modern lens mills now offer bio-based nylon lenses made from castor oil, allowing brands to align with eco-friendly initiatives.
The Cons:
- Premium Raw Material Cost: Nylon lenses are significantly more expensive to source than CR-39 and polycarbonate, which will raise your bill of materials (BOM).
- Tinting Difficulty: Because nylon is highly resistant to absorption, it cannot be easily tinted in standard tint baths. Custom colors and gradients must be formulated during the raw material casting stage, which requires higher MOQs.
4. Comparison Matrix: CR-39 vs. Polycarbonate vs. Nylon
| Performance Metric | CR-39 (Organic Plastic) | Polycarbonate (PC) | Nylon (Polyamide) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Optical Clarity (Abbe Value) | Excellent (58) | Fair (30) | Very Good (52) |
| Impact Resistance | Fair | Excellent (Shatterproof) | Excellent (Shatterproof) |
| Weight | Moderate | Light | Ultra-Light |
| Scratch Resistance | Good (Natural hardness) | Poor (Requires coating) | Good |
| Stress-Crack Resistance | Poor (Do not drill) | Fair (Prone to crazing) | Excellent (Ideal for rimless) |
| Color/Gradient Precision | Excellent (Easy to dye) | Fair | Good (Pre-molded dyes) |
| Relative Sourcing Cost | Moderate | Low | Premium |
| Best Suited For | Fashion, acetate opticals, gradient sunglasses | Sports, kids, safety glasses, budget sunglasses | Luxury designer, rimless, high-performance sunglasses |
5. Adding Value: Polarized Lenses & Coatings
Regardless of the base material you choose, you can elevate your sunglasses line by applying functional coatings:
- Polarization (TAC or Cast Polarized): Polarized lenses contain a special chemical filter that blocks horizontal light glare reflecting off surfaces like water, snow, and car hoods.
- Sourcing tip: For budget lines, TAC (Tri-Acetate Cellulose) polarized lenses are commonly paired with PC frames. For premium collections, polarized Nylon or CR-39 offers the ultimate premium viewing experience.
- Anti-Reflective (AR) Coating: Applied to the back surface of the lens to prevent light from bouncing off the back of the lens into the wearer’s eyes.
- Hydrophobic Coating: Repels water, sweat, and facial oils, making the lenses much easier to clean.
- Mirror Coatings: Flash mirrors or solid mirror coatings (in gold, blue, silver, etc.) not only look stylish but also reflect excess light away from the eyes.
6. Sourcing Custom Lenses with Hermitin
At Hermitin Optical, we believe that a premium frame deserves a premium lens. We source certified, high-grade lenses from leading global manufacturers to ensure compliance with international safety standards, including:
- US FDA 21 CFR 801.410 (Drop ball impact resistance test)
- ISO 12312-1 (European sunglass standard)
- ANSI Z80.3 (American national standard for sunglasses)
Whether you are launching a lightweight active sports brand using TR90 frames with polarized polycarbonate lenses, or a luxury fashion line using bio-acetate frames with certified bio-nylon lenses, we can custom-manufacture to your exact specifications. We also offer custom laser-engraved logos in the corner of the lenses for discrete, high-end branding.
Customize Your Sunglasses Line Today
Not sure which lens material fits your target price point and frame design? Let us help you calculate the best setup for your inventory.
For material samples, custom CAD engineering, or to request a catalog of our wholesale styles, connect with our OEM team today: