𝗪𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗪𝗲 𝗔𝗹𝗹 𝗕𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗖𝘆𝗯𝗼𝗿𝗴𝘀? “Cyborgs” makes for a great headline, but in 2026, the story of neurochips (brain–computer interfaces) is still about incremental clinical wins, and… | ToDigital

𝗪𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗪𝗲 𝗔𝗹𝗹 𝗕𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗖𝘆𝗯𝗼𝗿𝗴𝘀? “Cyborgs” makes for a great headline, but in 2026, the story of neurochips (brain–computer interfaces) is still about incremental clinical wins, and a big gap between PR and what patients can actually do. A working definition from the BCI Society frames a BCI as a system that measures brain activity and converts it (nearly) in real time into useful outputs, and may also modify brain activity via targeted stimulation — already hinting at why the boundary gets blurry fast. ​ I spoke with Peter Meijer, PhD, the developer of The vOICe, a sensory-substitution system that lets blind users “see with sound”.  Augmentation is the part we talk about, but restoration is the part that has evidence, and even there, the results are uneven. A few takeaways: BCI isn’t a protected term, so companies can stretch it to fit narratives, investor decks, and competitor maps. Yes, definitions can become politics. ​ In vision tech, hype often outruns function. Argus II, one of the best-known retinal prostheses, was FDA-approved and priced around $150,000 for the system itself, yet it delivered limited, low-resolution percepts and production was later halted. ​ “Atari graphics” vision-from-implants? In Meijer’s view there’s no evidence for that kind of fidelity yet, and scaling electrodes isn’t a magic wand because biology and safety constraints bite. More electrodes ≠ natural vision. So will we all become cyborgs? We do not really know. By Lidziya Tarasenka