N1 implant · Grey Matter

The N1 implant is Neuralink's fully implanted brain-computer interface: a sealed, coin-sized unit set into the skull that records from motor cortex through flexible threads and sends decoded activity wirelessly to a computer or phone, so that a person with paralysis can move a cursor by intending to move.

N1 implant. The N1 implant is Neuralink's fully implanted brain-computer interface: a sealed, coin-sized unit set into the skull that records from motor cortex through flexible threads and sends decoded activity wirelessly to a computer or phone, so that a person with paralysis can move a cursor by intending to move.

The unit is about 23 mm across and 8 mm thick and replaces a disc of skull. From it, 64 threads thinner than a hair, each carrying 16 electrodes (1,024 in all), are inserted a few millimetres into the cortex by a surgical robot, the R1, which places each thread while avoiding visible blood vessels. Amplification, digitisation and spike detection happen on the chip, the battery is charged inductively through the skin, and data leave by a low-power radio link. The design descends from the system Neuralink described in 2019, which had 3,072 electrodes on 96 threads in animals.

It is in early human trials. The United States regulator allowed the first study in May 2023, the first participant was implanted in January 2024, and by early 2026 the company reported about twenty participants across sites in several countries, all with severe paralysis.

Flexible threads are the bet. Thin polymer threads move with the brain and are meant to provoke less tissue reaction than rigid needles; in the first implant many threads retracted from the cortex within weeks, and the company compensated by changing how the remaining signals were decoded.

It reads spikes, so it reads intentions in detail, and the platform is meant to grow. A stimulating version aimed at restoring some vision, called Blindsight, received a breakthrough device designation from the US regulator in September 2024.

The N1 is an engineering answer to the access problem.

It does not read more neurons than research arrays have; it aims to make the implant sealed, wireless, robot-placed and repeatable.

Questions: How does an implant send out the data of a thousand electrodes through the skin? It does not send the raw signal. Sampled at 30 kHz with 10 bits, a thousand electrodes would produce about 300 megabits per second, far more than a low-power radio link through the skin carries on the power an implant can spend. Chips like those in the N1 amplify, digitise and detect spikes on the implant, then send only the times of spikes or compressed features per channel, which shrinks the stream by orders of magnitude and still carries what decoders of movement use. How many electrodes does Neuralink's implant have, and how are they placed? The N1 implant used in Neuralink's human studies has 1,024 electrodes spread along 64 flexible threads, 16 per thread, each thread thinner than a human hair. A surgical robot, the R1, inserts the threads one by one a few millimetres into the hand and arm area of motor cortex, steering around visible blood vessels, while the sealed implant replaces a disc of skull about 23 mm across. The first participant was implanted in January 2024, and the company reported about twenty participants by early 2026. Why do brain implant trials enrol only people with severe paralysis? Research ethics weighs risk against possible benefit, and brain surgery to place an experimental device carries real risks of bleeding, infection and seizures. Those risks can be justified only for people who stand to gain most and have the fewest alternatives, such as people with tetraplegia, ALS or locked-in conditions, which is why early feasibility studies like Neuralink's enrol them. The same choice makes consent delicate, since participants may have strong hopes and limited ways to communicate, and reviews of these trials ask that consent cover what happens to the device after the study.