Elon Musk Says 'In The Future, There Will Be No Phones.' He Predicts We'll Use His Brain Chip Instead Of iPhones Or Androids To Stay Connected

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Elon Muskhas never been shy about predicting the future — and lately, he's been throwing out ideas that sound straight out of a sci-fi script. He's said humanoid robots will one day outnumber people . He's predicted that artificial intelligence will make universal high income inevitable, turning work into something optional — "like growing vegetables." He's even promised humans will live on Mars.

So when a commentary account on X , known for covering Musk's companies and projects, asked followers, "Would you install a Neuralink interface on your brain to allow you to control your new X phone by thinking?" Musk didn't hesitate. He replied: "In the future, there will be no phones, just Neuralinks."

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It wasn't a declaration that smartphones are dead — not yet. It was a glimpse into the kind of world Musk expects his company, Neuralink, to create: one where communication, control, and computing happen directly through the brain. Neuralink's goal, Musk says, is to merge human cognition with technology — and erase the need for handheld devices altogether.

That vision might sound distant, but the groundwork is already visible. Neuralink's first human patient — a man with paralysis — successfully used the company's brain-computer implant to move a computer cursor, browse the web, and even play video games using only thought. 

During a Spaces event on X in February 2024, Musk said the patient could "move a mouse around the screen just by thinking." After a minor technical issue in which some of the implant's threads retracted, Neuralink tweaked the software to restore performance — and the patient's control reportedly improved beyond the original results.

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The device, called the N1 implant , contains more than 1,000 electrodes across 64 ultrathin threads thinner than a human hair. It sits inside the skull, where it can read and transmit brain signals wirelessly to a computer. Musk says the long-term plan is to scale this technology from restoring movement to eventually allowing people to communicate, access data, or control machines purely by thought.

At the 2024 Congress of Neurological Surgeons , Musk said Neuralink's brain implants shouldn't be a luxury reserved for the rich. He compared the procedure to LASIK eye surgery, suggesting that if robots perform it, it should take only about 600 seconds—roughly 10 minutes—and eventually cost around $5,000, similar to what patients pay for LASIK today.

In what Musk called "very high volume" production, he said the price could eventually drop to the cost of a consumer gadget — about $1,000 to $2,000 , roughly the price of an Apple Watch or a smartphone.

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Critics and fans alike weighed in under Musk's post. "I just can't do the brain surgery thing," one user wrote, pleading for a less invasive version. Another joked, "Cutting open my head to use a phone? No sir, I don't like it." Others, however, saw a future worth chasing — one where Neuralink connects minds as easily as Wi-Fi connects devices.

Musk's message wasn't about scrapping iPhones or Androids tomorrow. It was a statement of direction — a world where technology no longer sits in our hands but integrates with our biology. In Musk's view, the smartphone was a stepping stone. The next generation of "phones," he believes, won't slip into a pocket — they'll exist inside the human brain.

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This article Elon Musk Says 'In The Future, There Will Be No Phones.' He Predicts We'll Use His Brain Chip Instead Of iPhones Or Androids To Stay Connected originally appeared on Benzinga.com