Neurable Unveils “Neurable One” EEG-Enabled Headphones

Boston-based Neurable introduced the Neurable One, over-ear headphones with twelve dry EEG sensors in the nylon earpads. Priced at US $499, they combine 40 mm beryllium drivers, six microphones for active-noise cancellation, and ambient-pass-through with brain-monitoring that tracks focus, meditation depth, sleep quality, and longer-term metrics such as “brain age” and alpha peak frequency (APF). Battery life is 22 hours of music playback and about 12 hours with EEG active. The headphones went on sale online in October 2024.

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Neurable spun out of the University of Michigan, where co-founder and CEO Ramses Alcaide earned a Ph.D. in neuroscience and created AI algorithms for cleaning EEG data. Earlier products—MW75 Neuro (with Master & Dynamic) and Neuro LT—used the same dry-electrode approach but were sold through external audio brands. The Neurable One is the company’s first fully in-house hardware launch, allowing tighter integration of firmware and sensor layout.

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Neurable says the dry-EEG system can capture real-time attention levels and deliver audio nudges prompting breaks or refocus during work, study, or gaming. It also records longitudinal data to compute metrics such as capacity (focus before burnout) and APF, which Alcaide likens to heart-rate variability as a health indicator. In a blog post about a 20-participant trial of the MW75, Neurable reported 67 % of users experienced increased focus and suggests similar outcomes for the Neurable One.

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Alcaide emphasizes that Neurable’s approach moves beyond post-hoc reporting.

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• “It’s not just about tracking and seeing a report, but it’s also about how we change your habits,” — Ramses Alcaide, Neurable’s co-founder and CEO, tells WIRED

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• “Some of the electrodes, which are in direct contact with the skin, have potential to deliver data that’s of decent quality,” — Arnaud Delorme, UC San Diego

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Neurable asserts its proprietary algorithms compensate for the lack of conductive gel, enabling “decent quality” recordings from dry electrodes. Delorme’s assessment highlights persistent noise issues, suggesting reliable real-time feedback may still be limited. The claim that the headphones can deliver stable APF readings “over weeks and months” has not been independently verified, and user testing reported occasional signal loss despite a snug fit.

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Neurable plans to license the EEG platform to other manufacturers, potentially expanding “brain-aware” consumer gadgets. Whether the Neurable One can consistently deliver actionable neurofeedback across diverse real-world settings remains an open question, pending independent evaluations of dry-EEG data quality and the utility of its focus-nudging features.

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