Babies begin to see from birth, but their vision develops gradually over time:

• At birth, newborns can see light, shapes, and faces but their vision is blurry. They can best focus on objects about 8 to 12 inches (20 to 30 cm) away, roughly the distance to a parent's face during feeding.
• Within the first weeks, babies see in black and white and shades of gray and start slowly developing color vision. Their visual acuity at birth is quite poor (around 20/640, meaning they can only see clearly objects very close to them).
• By 6 weeks old, babies begin to focus better on faces and close objects, with some improvement in distance vision (about 12 inches away). They can follow moving objects with their eyes and start coordinating eye movements.
• By 3 months, babies can follow moving objects, focus on faces, and recognize familiar people.
• Around 4 months, infants' vision sharpens and color perception improves considerably. They develop binocular vision (using both eyes together), depth perception begins to develop, and they start to better distinguish colors and shapes.
• By 5 months, babies have good color vision and their eyes work together to form a 3D view of the world (depth perception).
• By 6 months, most babies have visual acuity near 20/60 and can differentiate objects better, including judging distances.
• From 7 to 12 months, babies improve eye-hand coordination, object grasping, and distance judgement as their vision matures toward adult levels.

In summary, while babies can see from birth, their vision starts out blurry and limited to close distances and minimal color perception. It rapidly improves in the first months, reaching good focus, color vision, and depth perception by about 5 to 6 months of age. Regular eye check-ups starting around 6 months are recommended to ensure healthy visual development.