What is brain training?
"Brain training" is an everyday label rather than a scientific term. Researchers usually call it cognitive training: structured, repeated practice of a mental task, often with feedback and with difficulty that adjusts as you improve. Each task is designed to load one process heavily, such as keeping track of a changing sequence or holding back an automatic response.
The interesting question is what the practice is for. A major 2016 review of the field looked specifically at the use of cognitive tasks or games to improve performance on other tasks [1]. That step, from the practised task to something else, is called transfer, and almost all the debate about brain training is about it.
The main kinds of brain training
The label covers at least three different things, with different evidence, so it helps to keep them apart.
| Kind | What you do | Examples | What it aims to change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Computerised task training | Repeat a short, game-like task that gets harder as you improve | N-back, Stroop, span tasks | A mental process, such as updating or inhibition |
| Strategy training | Learn a method and apply it to real material | Mnemonics, retrieval practice | How well you remember what you use it on |
| Activities with cognitive side-effects | Do something worthwhile in itself that also demands mental effort | Physical exercise | Health or skill first, thinking as a by-product |
Computerised task training is what most apps offer. In n-back you respond when an item matches the one shown N steps earlier; in Stroop training you name the ink colour of a word that spells a different colour. The hope is that strengthening the process behind the task will help elsewhere.
Strategy training teaches a technique rather than drilling a capacity. Active recall, testing yourself instead of re-reading, is one example. A review of ten common study techniques rated practice testing as one of only two with high utility, because it benefited learners of different ages and abilities across many kinds of tests [2]. Mnemonics are another: a meta-analysis of 21 randomised trials in healthy adults aged 50 and over found that mnemonic training improved episodic-memory scores (Hedges' g about 0.4), and the gain was still there at follow-up, a median of four months later [3]. A strategy is a tool: it helps when you use it on the material in front of you.
Activities with cognitive side-effects, such as physical exercise, are not training in the narrow sense. An umbrella review of 133 systematic reviews of randomised trials found that exercise improved general cognition, memory and executive function, with standardised effects between 0.24 and 0.42; the gains in memory and executive function were larger in children and adolescents than in adults [4].
What practice reliably improves
Researchers separate three levels of benefit:
- The trained task. You get better at the exercise you practise.
- Near transfer. You also improve on closely related tasks, such as a different working-memory test.
- Far transfer. You improve on different abilities or in daily life: reasoning, school or work performance, remembering appointments, staying focused in a meeting.
The 2016 review found extensive evidence that brain-training programmes improve performance on the trained tasks, less evidence for closely related tasks, and little evidence for distantly related tasks or everyday cognitive performance [1]. A meta-analysis of working-memory training found the same pattern: reliable short-term gains on working-memory tasks, which did not last for verbal tasks, and no convincing evidence of gains in verbal or nonverbal ability, inhibition, word decoding or arithmetic [5].
Stroop practice is no different. In a randomised study of 102 healthy young adults, three weeks of Stroop training improved Stroop performance but did not carry over to an untrained inhibition task, or to tasks of switching, updating and planning [6].
Drawing on meta-analyses of working-memory training, video games, music and chess, several of them their own, Sala and Gobet concluded that cognitive training has minimal effect on general cognitive skills, and that the differences between studies are explained by design quality and statistical artefacts [7].
So the honest summary is short: practice improves the practised task. For a closer look at the studies, read Does brain training work?. For the narrower intelligence question, see our review of brain games and IQ.
What large trials in older adults show
ACTIVE, one of the largest trials of cognitive training, randomly assigned 2,832 independent-living adults aged 65 to 94 in the United States to ten group sessions of memory, reasoning or speed-of-processing training, or to a no-contact control group; memory training taught mnemonic strategies, and speed training was practised on a computer [8]. Each kind of training improved the ability it targeted, and the gains lasted two years, but no effects on everyday functioning were detected at two years [8].
At the ten-year follow-up, reasoning and speed training still showed effects on the abilities they had trained, but memory training no longer did, and each trained group reported less difficulty with everyday tasks such as housework, finances and shopping than the control group [9]. That everyday finding has clear limits: it rests on self-ratings, the comparison group had no alternative activity, only 44% of participants were still in the study at ten years, and performance-based tests of everyday tasks showed no training effect [9].
A meta-analysis of 52 randomised trials (4,885 participants) of computerised training in healthy older adults found a small overall effect (g = 0.22): small to moderate effects on memory, processing speed and visuospatial skills, none on executive functions or attention, and no benefit from home-based training compared with group-based sessions [10].
How to choose an activity honestly
The research points to a simple rule: practise the thing you want to get better at, as directly as you can. The steps below are practical advice, not research findings.
- Name the outcome first. "Remember what I study" points to active recall on your own material; "concentrate at work" points to practising focused work itself.
- Read every claim level by level. Does it promise better scores on the app's tasks, on similar tasks, or in daily life? Who was studied, and for how long?
- Ask what the comparison was. A control group that did nothing is weaker evidence than one that did a convincing alternative activity.
- Measure what you care about directly. Our guide on how to measure progress in brain training shows how.
- Enjoy it for what it is. Liking puzzles is a good reason to do them, as long as they don't crowd out exercise, sleep or real learning.
How LaserMind approaches it
- Evidence grades per outcome. Each of our 73 methods is graded for a stated outcome, not given one overall verdict: n-back is E2 (conditional evidence) for "n-back and similar working-memory tasks", active recall is E1 (strong evidence) for long-term retention of studied material, and popular claims that research does not support are marked Not supported. How we review evidence explains the scale.
- Your own history is the only benchmark. Scores are compared with your personal bests and recent sessions. We never rank you against "the population", and we never convert a score into IQ or an age.
- Transfer checks. About every four weeks, the LaserMind Check-in uses four short tasks in versions that our programmes and the Daily Circuit don't train, and your report shows trained tasks, untrained tasks and real-life measures side by side.
What the research says
Try it on LaserMind
▶ N-BackPractise updating, and notice that what rises is your n-back level.
What research has not established
- Much of the large-scale evidence comes from older adults, and the results may not apply to younger people.
- Trials test specific programmes, not apps in general. LaserMind's exercises are based on standard research tasks, but they have not been tested in trials of their own.
- Everyday outcomes are often self-reported, and long-term follow-up is limited: the ACTIVE trial had lost more than half of its participants by ten years.
- The evidence does not all point the same way: the ACTIVE ten-year self-reports suggest a benefit for daily life, while reviews of many studies find little evidence of everyday benefits.
- The exercise evidence pools many populations and types of exercise, and effects differ between groups.
Frequently asked questions
Is brain training a waste of time? Not if you want to get better at the task itself or enjoy the challenge. It is a poor substitute for practising the skill you actually care about.
How soon will I see results? On the trained task, scores usually rise over the first sessions, partly because you are learning the task itself. Whether anything else changes needs a different kind of check, which our progress guide explains.
References
- Simons, D. J., Boot, W. R., Charness, N., Gathercole, S. E., Chabris, C. F., Hambrick, D. Z., & Stine-Morrow, E. A. L. (2016). Do "brain-training" programs work? Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 17(3), 103–186. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100616661983
- Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K. A., Marsh, E. J., Nathan, M. J., & Willingham, D. T. (2013). Improving students' learning with effective learning techniques. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100612453266
- Chen, S., Cai, Z., Hou, J., Lang, M., Zheng, Z., Zhu, X., & Li, J. (2022). Long-term effects of mnemonic training in healthy older adults: A meta-analysis. Psychology and Aging, 37(8), 954–971. https://doi.org/10.1037/pag0000712
- Singh, B., et al. (2025). Effectiveness of exercise for improving cognition, memory and executive function: A systematic umbrella review and meta-meta-analysis. British Journal of Sports Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2024-108589
- Melby-Lervåg, M., & Hulme, C. (2013). Is working memory training effective? A meta-analytic review. Developmental Psychology, 49(2), 270–291. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0028228
- Talanow, T., & Ettinger, U. (2018). Effects of task repetition but no transfer of inhibitory control training in healthy adults. Acta Psychologica, 187, 37–53. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2018.04.016
- Sala, G., & Gobet, F. (2019). Cognitive training does not enhance general cognition. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 23(1), 9–20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2018.10.004
- Ball, K., Berch, D. B., Helmers, K. F., et al. (2002). Effects of cognitive training interventions with older adults: A randomized controlled trial. JAMA, 288(18), 2271–2281. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.288.18.2271
- Rebok, G. W., Ball, K., Guey, L. T., et al. (2014). Ten-year effects of the Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly cognitive training trial on cognition and everyday functioning in older adults. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 62(1), 16–24. https://doi.org/10.1111/jgs.12607
- Lampit, A., Hallock, H., & Valenzuela, M. (2014). Computerized cognitive training in cognitively healthy older adults: A systematic review and meta-analysis of effect modifiers. PLoS Medicine, 11(11), e1001756. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1001756