Does brain training increase your IQ? What the science says

It's the question every brain-training app quietly implies and rarely answers honestly: will this make me smarter? Here's the straight version, without the marketing gloss.

The short answer

No, brain games won't meaningfully raise a measured IQ score, and the studies that once suggested otherwise haven't held up well. IQ is fairly stable, and getting better at a game mostly makes you better at that game — what researchers call “near transfer,” which fades the further you move from the trained task.

So what's the point?

Plenty, if you reframe the goal. You're not buying a higher IQ; you're building a daily habit of focused, deliberate practice — and that habit has real, everyday payoffs.

Don't chase a bigger IQ number. Chase a sharper, calmer ten minutes — that you can actually have.

That's the honest promise behind Cognito: not a miracle, but a genuinely good daily habit — useful, free, and built to respect your time.