How Stepwave works.
Discover how Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hubs, Home Training, Personalization and Your Personal Guidance together to protect brain-body health over the long term.
A fundamentally new model for brain-body health.
Your brain doesn't work in isolation. It always interacts with your body and environment. Therefore, experts globally agree that exercise for brain health should combine exercise, brain training, and social interactions.*
exercise
brain training
However, most exercise offerings for brain-body health focus on a single piece of the puzzle, or require you to combine different programs or technologies on your own. Stepwave connects everything into one continuous program — backed by scientific evidence.
*World Health Organization 2026Izquierdo et al. 2025 and Veronese et al. 2023
Today's options
Isolated. One piece at a time.
- A brain-training app
No human guidance. No social connection. No way to verify objectively if training truly impacts your daily life — and doesn't just improve your performance in the games played.
- Group exercise classes or a gym membership
Require travel, provide only minimal personal guidance, and provide few offerings for tailored brain training. Most people stop showing up after a few weeks.
- A therapist
Limited sessions — usually ends after 9–18 sessions. And be honest, do you perform the prescribed exercises at home in between sessions?
- An expensive device
Clinic only. You can't use it at home.
Stepwave
Connected. One coherent program.
- Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hubs
Personalized group sessions with a certified physiotherapist — empowering you with the knowledge, tools, and structured support to succeed in your brain-body health journey.
- Digital Home Training
Short daily sessions in your home. We provide, install, and maintain the device, so you can focus on your progress to achieve your goals — boosted by high-frequency short training sessions.
- Personalization
We adapt every session to your abilities, participation, and goals. We regularly check and discuss with you whether you're meeting your goals and provide you with objective progress reports.
- Your Brain-Body Health Coach
A certified physiotherapist who knows your goals, needs, and progress, and calibrates the system and your tailored Stepwave journey accordingly.
Every part of Stepwave is designed to support every other part..Together, our brain-body health coaches and technologies create a coherent program that fits naturally into your everyday life.
We support your brain-body health journey consistently — not for weeks, but over months and years.
Move. Think. Breathe.
None of this is guesswork. Stepwave's design draws on three mechanisms that a growing body of exercise and neuroscience research links to healthy brain aging.
Step
Moving while Thinking
Our step-based, brain-body exercise videogames (= exergames) challenge you to move while solving cognitive tasks simultaneously. Like in everyday life, you remember sequences and adjust your stepping patterns by reacting to your environment or changing rules.
Opposed to brain training in seated position, this trains your brain–body interaction — that declines earliest in dementia and is crucial to maintain independence in everyday life.
“Myokines”
Moving your large muscles such as your legs releases substances that researchers call myokines. Several of these myokines travel to the brain and lay the biological groundwork for new learning and growth — priming the brain to change, the way fertiliser primes soil for growth.
“Guided-Plasticity Facilitation”
During and after movement, the brain is more receptive to change thanks to these myokines. The targeted brain exercises in Stepwave are designed to guide that fresh capacity toward real-world skills — like navigating through a city, buying groceries, or playing hide and seek with your grandchildren — rather than leaving it to chance.
Wave
Breathe
Guided breathing that adapts to your heart signals in real-time stimulates to synchronize heart and brain waves — a state called physiological coherence. This supports attention, emotional regulation and resilience while amplifying the effects of the motor-cognitive training.
Plus: You can use the learned techniques whenever you wish to calm your mind — for example to help you fall asleep and have a high quality sleep which helps consolidating what you've learned in training
“Central Autonomic Regulation”
The guided breathing in StepWave is designed to help balance the nervous system between alertness and calm. A more balanced nervous system is associated with lower stress reactivity and better focus — creating better conditions for the training to take hold.
Built on Science, not Promises.
Stepwave is based on the pioneering ‘Brain-IT’ concept. It was developed, tested and refined through six years of research with one goal: helping people build brain-body resilience to stay fit for longer.
6 years of research.
19 peer-reviewed publications.
And counting.
- 128 study participants*
- 1'939 individual training sessions
- 742 hours of training
- 446 measurement sessions
* 59 individuals with mild neurocognitive disorder, 59 healthy older adults, and 10 experts (therapists, neuropsychologists, other exergaming researchers, or representatives from the exergaming industry).
Our Evidence
100% of participants perceived the training as useful, and 55% showed measurable cognitive improvements that noticeably eased their daily lives already after 3 months — compared to only 23% in the control group continuing their usual routines.
(Manser et al. 2024 and 2023)
"Brain-IT" training showed early scientific indications of positive changes in the trained brain regions that are associated with memory and self-regulation.
(Manser et al. 2025 and 2026)
Participants performed, on average, 21% more sessions than instructed — because they perceived the training as useful, fun, and effective.
Most participants completed the 12-week program and wanted to continue afterwards because it naturally became part of their weekly routine.
Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hubs.
The place where your journey begins.
Your Stepwave journey begins in a local Brain-Body Health Hub, where science meets human connection. Guided by licensed physiotherapists as your brain-body health coaches, you'll move from your first assessment to training with your group — and, when you're ready, to training at home.
Each session combines moving while thinking with guided breathing into one structured experience that is enjoyable and scientifically grounded.
Every session has one purpose: improving the interaction between body and brain to bring you one step closer to your goal.
Not technically savvy? Don't worry — we install everything and give you a personal introduction and continued support.
A typical Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hub session.
45 – 60 minutes start to finish.
Meet your brain-body health coach and your group of peers. Verify your goals and prepare for today's session.
Complete brain-body exergames that challenge balance, coordination, memory, and decision-making.
In between Moving while Thinking games, train your brain-heart connection through Guided Breathing games that adapt to your heart signals in real time.
We analyze and discuss your progress together, so that we can prepare and personalize your next sessions at home to help you achieve your goals.
Our Stepwave Brain-Body health coach given you practical tipps on how to integrate the latest scientific findings in your lifesytel to help you stay sharp and build lasting resilience.
We agree on your exercise goals for the week ahead and clear up any open questions. No essays, no exams — just the good kind of homework. Good luck, and see you next week!
You're not just exercising. You're training your brain with people who know your journey.
Technology that stays in the background.
Whether you train at a Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hub or at home — the hardware is identical. One simple box that you only need to plug into your TV or other large screen and turn on. All portable, nothing you need to buy separately.
What's in the box?
Every component of our system has been designed to make training simple, intuitive, and consistent — so you can focus entirely on your progress, not on the technology.
Keep building your brain-body health at home
The most effective brain-body training doesn't happen once a week. It becomes part of everyday life through short sessions at high frequency. Stepwave helps you continue your progress between Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hub visits through short sessions that fit naturally into your daily routine. Simply start your session and Stepwave takes care of the rest.
What happens at home.
20 – 30 minutes start to finish.
Start your session — upon the press of a button — whenever it suits your day.
Complete brain-body exergames that challenge balance, coordination, memory, and decision-making.
In between Move & Think games, train your brain-heart connection through Guided Breathing games that adapt to your heart signals in real time.
Our system shows you your progress and asks you about your experience.
Your progress and feedback are securely shared with your brain-body health coach. This allows us to prepare and personalize your next sessions at home to help you achieve your goals.
The best brain-body health exercise program isn't the most intensive one. It's the one you'll do frequently, integrate in your daily routine, and still be following next year.
Every session is uniquely Yours.
No two people age in the same way. That's why no two Stepwave programs are identical. Our system adapts every session to your abilities, participation, and goals. We regularly check and discuss with you whether you're meeting your goals and provide you with objective progress reports.
What we personalize
You don't simply exercise harder over time — we systematically provide you with the challenges your brain needs to build cognitive reserve throughout your life.
Your brain-body health coach selects the exercise content according to your personal goals — whether that's everyday memory, steadier movement, or something else. That way, you always train what matters most to you to achieve your goals.
The types of games you play are selected and continuously updated based on a comprehensive analysis of your current physical and mental performance. So you not only challenge the areas with room for improvement, but also strengthen the abilities you already excel at.
For each function and game type your need to train to achieve your brain-body health goals, we empower you to choose from a selection of exergames with different designs, contents, and narratives. Being in control of selecting activities that match your personal preferences keeps your brain-body health routine enjoyable — and enjoyable routines are the ones people stick with.
The speed and complexity of every game adjust continuously to your capabilities, so you're always training at the right level — not too easy and not too challenging. We only layer in extra tasks or demands once you're ready for them — never all at once.
Technology supports your brain-body health coach. It never replaces them
Behind every Stepwave program is a licensed physiotherapist as your personal brain-body health coach. They understand your goals, your progress and your individual needs, and calibrate the system and your tailored Stepwave journey accordingly.
Throughout your journey.
Understand your current mental and physical strengths — and the key areas where our program helps you to improve.
Support you during Stepwave Brain-Body Health Hub sessions — and remotely monitor your digital home training.
Monitor and discuss your participation, progress, and goal achievement over time.
Your program is continuously adjusted and calibrated to your goals, participation, and progress.
Stepwave's program, brain-body health coaches, and community help you stay motivated for the long term.
Technology provides insights. Your coach provides guidance. Together they help you stay on track over the long term.
Every part of Stepwave is designed to support every other part.
Brain health isn't a twelve-week challenge. Stepwave's ecosystem is designed to make personalized brain-body training in a social environment part of your weekly routine — because lasting brain-body health isn't created through intensity. It's created through consistency.
Ready to take the next step?
Join the waiting list and be among the first to experience the Stepwave program.
Stepwave is currently intended for brain-body engagement, health promotion, and performance training, educational purposes, and wellness, and is based on the recommendations of a global expert consensus on promoting physical and brain health. It has not yet been certified as a medical device, and we therefore make no claim that our technology is intended for the diagnosis, treatment, cure, relief, monitoring, or prevention of diseases or health conditions.