What is the Unicorn Education Kit?

The Unicorn Education Kit is a complete, classroom-ready platform for teaching EEG, brain-computer interfaces and neurotechnology at university level. It bundles either eight or four Unicorn Hybrid Black EEG headsets with the full Unicorn Suite software environment, the Unicorn Speller, the Python, MATLAB, Simulink, C, .NET and Unity APIs, video tutorials, documentation and GitHub example resources.

One kit supports up to 40 students working in teams across a full semester. Because the headsets are wireless and self-contained, students are not limited to scheduled laboratory hours: they can take a headset home and keep developing their project, which is what makes a semester-long BCI course practical rather than aspirational.

Key Features

• 8x or 4x Unicorn Hybrid Black: The full kit supports up to 40 students in teams of five; the Mini supports up to 20.
• Complete software environment: Unicorn Suite with Recorder, Bandpower and Speller, plus Python, MATLAB, Simulink, C, .NET and Unity APIs.
• P300 Speller included: Students work with a real, functioning BCI application from the first weeks of the course.
• Teaching materials supplied: Video tutorials, documentation and GitHub examples reduce course preparation time.
• Dry and wet recording: Hybrid electrodes let students compare setup speed against signal quality directly.
• 24-bit resolution with 4096x oversampling: Research-grade data quality, so exercises produce results students can actually analyse.
• Students work from home: Wireless headsets remove the laboratory-time bottleneck.
• No subscription fees: Software, APIs and updates are included with no recurring licensing to administer.
• Substantial saving: Around 40 percent less than buying the equivalent components individually.

What students learn

Students work through the complete BCI development workflow: acquiring high-quality EEG recordings, understanding electrode placement, preprocessing brain signals, extracting features, building P300, SSVEP and motor imagery interfaces, applying machine learning and finally developing their own applications. By the end of a semester they have built things like P300 spellers, brain-controlled robots, neurofeedback applications, Unity games, smart home interfaces and EEG classifiers.

How a semester runs

The typical structure introduces EEG and BCI concepts alongside hands-on recording, moves into guided practical assignments on signal processing and paradigm implementation, then hands over to student-designed projects. At the end of the semester teams present and demonstrate what they built. Step-by-step tutorials and documentation carry most of the preparation load, which matters when the same course runs every year.

Which courses it fits

The platform is used in biomedical engineering, neuroscience, psychology, electrical engineering, robotics, signal processing, human-computer interaction and assistive technology programmes. Lukas Traxler at the University of Applied Sciences Vienna uses it across two courses: one to record and understand EEG data, another to process it in more technical depth.

Beyond the classroom

The kit connects a department to the wider BCI community. g.tec counts roughly 80 hours of hands-on EEG and BCI education with the Unicorn Hybrid Black, 30 hours of project-based learning through the international BR41N.IO hackathon, and 140 hours of lectures and workshops at the BCI and Neurotechnology Spring School. Universities that own an Education Kit can become official BR41N.IO hosting institutions, letting students compete remotely alongside teams worldwide and giving the department visibility at international neurotechnology events.

What is included

• 8 or 4 Unicorn Hybrid Black EEG headsets with caps and electrodes
• Unicorn Suite, Unicorn Recorder, Unicorn Bandpower and Unicorn Speller
• Python API, MATLAB interface, Simulink interface, C API, .NET API and Unity interface
• Video tutorials, documentation and GitHub resources
• Software updates with no subscription fees