Compact model
EEGNet: results on public EEG datasets
EEGNet is a compact convolutional neural network for EEG-based brain–computer interfaces, proposed by Lawhern et al. (U.S. Army Research Laboratory; Journal of Neural Engineering, 2018) and tested on P300, ERN, MRCP and SMR data. It applies a temporal convolution, a depthwise spatial convolution and a separable convolution, followed by a softmax classifier.
Measured on: ds003810; EEGMAT; BETA; ds006593; TMNRED / ds005383; EESM19 scalp subset; ds005342; Wearable SSVEP BCI dataset (dry and wet electrodes); OpenBMI motor imagery (Lee et al. 2019); BOAS · Bitbrain Open Access Sleep dataset · Protocols: Motor imagery & rest; Arithmetic & rest; SSVEP · 8 channels; SSVEP · 4 channels; P300 target ERP; Semantic target ERP; Sleep staging; Idle & command
Also known as EEGNet · EEGNet-8,2 · EEGNet-4,2 · EEGNetv4 · Lawhern et al. 2018
Directory status: Evaluated · Official code ↗ · Implementation used here ↗ · Description sources arxiv.org · doi.org · pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov · github.com
Published results
Compare figures within a group only: task, cohort, chance level and electrode layout can differ between groups. One row is above another only where their 95% intervals do not overlap.
ds003810 · Core matrix · motor imagery & rest
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Rest versus right-hand imagery | Balanced accuracy | 71.0%65.0%–76.3% | 10 |
ds003810 · Reliable decisions · when to decline a decision (crude: ten people)
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Fixed threshold: calibrated confidence at least 0.8 | Windows accepted | 250 / 1,2000 of 10 people had nothing accepted. | 10 |
| EEGNet | Learned reject option minus calibrated confidence, same classifier (a secondary contrast) | Error among the 80% most certain, difference | +0.9 pp−0.4 pp–+2.4 ppNo difference resolved: the interval includes zero. | 10 |
Limits: Ten people, two per test fold. Bootstrap intervals are crude; no person-level dispersion is published. Balanced, so no deployment rate. Its learned-reject contrasts are secondary. Calibration data are participant-disjoint inner out-of-fold scores (cross-fit). Inner models see about 3/4 of the training people, so they may be less confident than the full model whose scores are tested. This approximation is part of every calibrated figure. Rejecting likely errors on known classes is not detecting unfamiliar input. An uncertainty threshold may not flag an unseen class (https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13324). Route 1 makes no out-of-distribution claim. A contrast is called a difference only when its paired 95% participant-bootstrap interval excludes 0 (no multiplicity correction); otherwise "no difference resolved". No ranking where intervals overlap. Descriptive entries are never called differences. Every limitation of route 1 →
EEGMAT · Core matrix · arithmetic & rest
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Serial subtraction versus resting EEG | Balanced accuracy | 67.6%62.8%–72.5% | 36 |
EEGMAT · Reliable decisions · when to decline a decision
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Fixed threshold: calibrated confidence at least 0.8 | Windows accepted | 126 / 2,16019 of 36 people had nothing accepted. | 36 |
| EEGNet | Learned reject option minus calibrated confidence, same classifier | Error among the 80% most certain, difference | +2.3 pp+0.6 pp–+4.1 ppDifference resolved: the interval excludes zero. | 36 |
Limits: Balanced by design. Error rates describe a 1:1 mix and are a method comparison, not a deployment rate. Class equals recording, so recording-level differences are part of what any model or selector can use. Calibration data are participant-disjoint inner out-of-fold scores (cross-fit). Inner models see about 3/4 of the training people, so they may be less confident than the full model whose scores are tested. This approximation is part of every calibrated figure. Rejecting likely errors on known classes is not detecting unfamiliar input. An uncertainty threshold may not flag an unseen class (https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13324). Route 1 makes no out-of-distribution claim. A contrast is called a difference only when its paired 95% participant-bootstrap interval excludes 0 (no multiplicity correction); otherwise "no difference resolved". No ranking where intervals overlap. Descriptive entries are never called differences. Every limitation of route 1 →
BETA · Core matrix · SSVEP, 8 channels
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | 40 visual targets · 8 posterior electrodes | Balanced accuracy | 55.8%50.1%–61.3% | 70 |
BETA · Core matrix · SSVEP, 4 channels
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | 40 visual targets · 4 posterior electrodes | Balanced accuracy | 44.1%38.6%–49.6% | 70 |
BETA · Reliable decisions · when to decline a decision
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Fixed threshold: calibrated confidence at least 0.8 | Trials accepted | 1,863 / 11,20010 of 70 people had nothing accepted. | 70 |
| EEGNet | Learned reject option minus calibrated confidence, same classifier | Error among the 80% most certain, difference | +0.8 pp+0.02 pp–+1.6 ppDifference resolved: the interval excludes zero. | 70 |
Limits: Uniform target prior by design; cue-paced lab spelling with no idle state, so no false-activation figure of any kind. Calibration data are participant-disjoint inner out-of-fold scores (cross-fit). Inner models see about 3/4 of the training people, so they may be less confident than the full model whose scores are tested. This approximation is part of every calibrated figure. Rejecting likely errors on known classes is not detecting unfamiliar input. An uncertainty threshold may not flag an unseen class (https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13324). Route 1 makes no out-of-distribution claim. A contrast is called a difference only when its paired 95% participant-bootstrap interval excludes 0 (no multiplicity correction); otherwise "no difference resolved". No ranking where intervals overlap. Descriptive entries are never called differences. Every limitation of route 1 →
ds006593 · Core matrix · P300 target ERP
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Visual target versus nontarget events | Balanced accuracy | 53.3%51.7%–54.9% | 21 |
TMNRED / ds005383 · Core matrix · semantic target ERP
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Reading · target versus nontarget events | Balanced accuracy | 61.4%58.9%–64.0% | 30 |
EESM19 scalp subset · Core matrix · sleep staging
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Five stages · balanced scalp-EEG sample | Balanced accuracy | 56.5%54.9%–58.3% | 20 |
ds005342 · Core matrix · idle & command
Wearable SSVEP BCI dataset (dry and wet electrodes) · Dry vs. wet sensor transfer
| Method | Condition | Metric | Value | People |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEGNet | Trained on wet, tested on wet | Balanced accuracy | 75.0%70.3%–79.5% | 102 |
| EEGNet | Trained on wet, tested on dry | Balanced accuracy | 45.6%40.5%–50.8% | 102 |
| EEGNet | Trained on dry, tested on wet | Balanced accuracy | 64.0%59.1%–68.8% | 102 |
| EEGNet | Trained on dry, tested on dry | Balanced accuracy | 56.8%51.9%–61.6% | 102 |
Cite this page
BCI Report (2026). EEGNet: results on public EEG datasets. https://bci.report/methods/eegnet/
Figures from releases shared-representation-update-20261007 (2026-10-07), reliable-decisions-update-20261004 (2026-10-04), deployment-topics-20260920-v1 (2026-09-20), research-preview-20260920 (2026-09-20). Cite the upstream datasets as well: each dataset’s page gives its credit.
Every release is archived on Zenodo: doi:10.5281/zenodo.23123296. BibTeX for the site and its releases → · CITATION.cff ↗