Brain Games: What They Actually Train (and What They Don't)
Brain-training games reliably make you better at that game - and surprisingly little else. Here's the near-transfer vs. far-transfer research that explains why, the $2M Lumosity lesson, and what the scientists actually recommend instead.
By Hilly Shore Labs
Key Takeaways
- Brain games make you better at the game, not at life - the strongest research review found extensive gains on trained tasks but little effect on everyday cognition.
- Near transfer is real; far transfer isn't - practice carries to nearly identical tasks, rarely to your job, driving, or general memory.
- The market already paid for the overclaim - Lumosity settled with the FTC for $2M over unfounded 'sharper in every aspect of life' and anti-dementia claims.
- Spend the hour better - the scientists' own recommendation is physical activity, learning a demanding new skill, and real social contact, not another app streak.
In January 2016, the maker of Lumosity - the most heavily advertised "brain-training" app in the world - agreed to pay the U.S. Federal Trade Commission $2 million to settle deceptive-advertising charges. Its ads had promised the games could sharpen performance at work and school and "delay age-related cognitive decline," even guard against dementia and Alzheimer's. The FTC's verdict was blunt: "Lumosity simply did not have the science to back up its ads."
That case is the fastest way to understand what brain games do and don't do. They're genuinely engaging, and you will almost certainly get better at them. The open question - the one that decides whether they're worth your time - is whether getting better at the game makes you better at anything else.
The $2 million question
The Lumosity settlement wasn't a fringe complaint. Two years earlier, the science had already split into open warfare. In 2014, two large groups of researchers published dueling public letters, read the same body of studies, and reached opposite "consensus" views.
When two panels of serious scientists reach opposite "consensus" conclusions from the same evidence, the disagreement usually isn't about the data - it's about the standard for judging it. The tiebreaker arrived in 2016.
Near transfer vs. far transfer: the one idea that explains everything
That year, a team led by psychologist Daniel Simons published the field's most thorough review, in Psychological Science in the Public Interest. They graded every study the brain-training companies themselves cited as evidence - presumably the strongest case available - against a defined set of best practices. Their finding, verbatim: "extensive evidence that brain-training interventions improve performance on the trained tasks, less evidence that such interventions improve performance on closely related tasks, and little evidence that training enhances performance on distantly related tasks or that training improves everyday cognitive performance."
That one sentence is the whole story, and it has a name.
Put plainly: a brain-training game makes you better at that game, and not much else. The improvement is real - it just doesn't travel. Much of even the near-transfer gain, the reviewers note, can come from learning a task-specific trick or simply getting more motivated, not from any broad upgrade to the underlying ability.
The honest exceptions
Fairness cuts both ways, and the flat claim "brain games do nothing" overshoots the evidence too. The 2014 Stanford Center on Longevity and Max Planck Institute consensus - the skeptical letter - still flagged a couple of intriguing results: computerized speed-of-processing training has been linked to better driving and fewer accidents in older adults, and one study found that 100 days of practicing a dozen different tasks produced small, general gains in reasoning and episodic memory that partly held up two years later. Real signals - but small, narrow, effortful, and nothing like the "unlock your full potential" the ads sell.
What the scientists recommend instead
Here's the part the debunkers usually skip: the skeptics didn't say "give up on your brain." They pointed you somewhere with better odds. The consensus recommendation - based, honestly, largely on correlational evidence - is to lead a "physically active, intellectually challenging, and socially engaged" life, and to weigh the opportunity cost of the games: an hour of solo software drills is an hour not spent walking, learning a language, or seeing friends.
| Instead of another brain-game streak, spend the time on... | Why the scientists rate it higher |
|---|---|
| Regular physical activity / aerobic exercise | Top recommendation in the consensus; the activity itself benefits brain and body regardless of transfer |
| Learning a genuinely new, complex skill (a language, an instrument) | Sustained, effortful novelty - closer to how far transfer might actually happen |
| Real social engagement | Consistently linked to slower cognitive decline in long-term studies of aging |
| A brain-training app | Reliable near transfer only - you get better at the app. Fine as fun; weak as "training" |
What most people get wrong
The overclaim to drop is "brain games make you smarter." The best available review found little evidence they improve everyday cognition, and the most heavily marketed one paid $2 million for saying otherwise. The falsifiable claim worth keeping is narrow and well-supported: brain-training games reliably improve the trained game and closely related tasks, and reliably do not deliver broad, lasting gains to real-world thinking. If a program promises to reverse cognitive decline or make you sharper "in every aspect of life," that specific promise is the one with no compelling science behind it. Play them because they're fun. Just don't buy them as medicine - and if you like the puzzle itch, feed it with real mechanical brain-teasers or a proper screen-free reset, which at least come with their own rewards.
Brain games FAQ
Do brain-training games actually make you smarter?
Not in the broad sense the ads imply. The strongest evidence review found they reliably improve the specific trained tasks but show little effect on general intelligence or everyday cognitive performance. You get better at the game; that gain rarely transfers.
What's the difference between near transfer and far transfer?
Near transfer is improvement on tasks very similar to the one you trained; far transfer is improvement on genuinely different, real-world abilities. Brain games reliably produce near transfer and rarely produce far transfer - which is exactly why they feel effective without changing much.
If not brain games, what actually helps my cognition?
The scientists' own recommendation is a physically active, intellectually challenging, and socially engaged life - regular exercise, learning a demanding new skill, and real social contact. The evidence is largely correlational, but those activities pay off whether or not "transfer" ever happens.
Sources
- U.S. Federal Trade Commission (2016). Lumosity to Pay $2 Million to Settle FTC Deceptive Advertising Charges for Its "Brain Training" Program - the company "simply did not have the science to back up its ads."
- Simons, D. J., et al. (2016). Do "Brain-Training" Programs Work? Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 17(3) - extensive evidence for trained-task gains, little evidence for improved everyday cognition.
- Stanford Center on Longevity & Max Planck Institute for Human Development (2014). A Consensus on the Brain Training Industry from the Scientific Community - "no compelling scientific evidence to date"; recommends active, challenging, socially engaged living.
What people on Reddit actually say
- r/cognitivescience⬆ strong consensus
The recurring take is that brain-training results are a textbook case of near transfer - people post their rising game scores and then admit nothing about work, memory, or focus actually changed, which is exactly what the transfer literature predicts.
- r/Nootropics💬 commonly repeated
Even in a community hungry for cognitive edges, the common conclusion is that the money is better spent on sleep, exercise, and learning something genuinely hard than on a brain-game subscription - the apps are treated as entertainment, not training.
Paraphrased consensus from public threads — no direct user quotes.
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