BrainCheck vs Linus Health (2026)
The two ends of this category's AI spectrum, and the choice is between a settled tool and a moving frontier. BrainCheck is a digitised, normed battery of established neuropsychological tests, graded C on AI centrality precisely because there is little model doing the work, but its evidence is strong and maps exactly to what it is cleared to do, and it names its CPT codes and reimbursement path openly. Linus Health is genuinely AI native: the DCTclock analyses the drawing process itself, stylus dynamics and speech acoustics with no paper equivalent, and its commercial story is predicting amyloid status, which matters because disease modifying Alzheimer's therapies require confirmed pathology. The catch on Linus is scope, since it is cleared for cognitive assessment while its headline claim is biomarker prediction, much of it still in conference abstracts. If your failure mode is a reimbursable, validated screen you can bill today, start with BrainCheck. If your failure mode is predicting who carries amyloid pathology for the treatment era, start with Linus, and confirm which claims fall inside the cleared indication.
- The reimbursement path is published: BrainCheck names the specific CPT codes, the time based minimums, and telehealth eligibility in an annually updated guide, graded A on commercial transparency where Linus publishes no pricing or code level guidance and grades C.
- Strong, settled evidence for the cleared use: a 99 participant validation reporting at least 88 percent sensitivity and specificity for dementia, an r=0.77 correlation with the MoCA, and a 529 participant multi site study, all for the cognitive assessment the product is actually cleared to perform.
- A validated battery whose scope is clearly drawn: prominently stated as not a stand alone diagnostic, graded A on autonomy, with the reimbursement and normative data as the moat rather than an algorithm whose claims are still moving.
- Genuinely AI native, not digitised: the DCTclock analyses the entire drawing process, capturing stylus dynamics and speech acoustics that have no paper equivalent, graded A on AI centrality where BrainCheck's normed battery grades C, and A on model transparency for peer reviewed method disclosure.
- The commercially important capability is biomarker prediction: peer reviewed work found the DCTclock correlated with amyloid PET in cognitively normal people and the DCR predicting PET status in the 930 participant Bio-Hermes-001 study, which addresses treatment eligibility rather than screening alone.
- The best governance posture in this sweep: the team names the cultural and educational bias failure mode directly and publishes the uncomfortable findings, including a South Asian cohort where scores fell with age and lower education, graded A.
This comparison is published by AI Health Index, an independent research platform that compares healthcare AI vendors objectively. BrainCheck and Linus Health are each graded against the same capability taxonomy, from each vendor's own public materials and the regulatory record, under the AI Health Index verification standard. No vendor pays for placement, and no vendor has reviewed this page. How this evidence is graded
Plain facts
| Fact | BrainCheck | Linus Health |
|---|---|---|
| Primary category | Clinical Decision Support | Clinical Decision Support |
| Founded | 2015 | 2019 |
| Headquarters | Austin, Texas, United States | Boston, Massachusetts, United States |
| Website | braincheck.com | linushealth.com |
Side by Side
Each record in one paragraph
Written to be quoted whole. Each paragraph states what the AI Health Index verified about the vendor, with the caveats attached. Generated from this pair’s live capability grades, so it moves when a grade moves.
The AI Health Index awards BrainCheck its top capability grade on several axes, including Autonomy and Oversight Model, Clinical and Operational Evidence and HIPAA and BAA Posture. Set against Linus Health, BrainCheck grades higher on several axes, including Autonomy and Oversight Model, HIPAA and BAA Posture and Security Certifications and Trust Center. Its thinnest published disclosure sits on Model Supply Chain Disclosure. Grades reflect evidence the AI Health Index could verify at the last review, so a low grade records disclosure the vendor has not published rather than a capability it has been shown to lack.
Source: AI Health Index, July 2026
The AI Health Index awards Linus Health its top capability grade on several axes, including AI Centrality, Model and Technology Transparency and Clinical and Operational Evidence. Set against BrainCheck, Linus Health grades higher on several axes, including AI Centrality, Model and Technology Transparency and Model Supply Chain Disclosure. Grades reflect evidence the AI Health Index could verify at the last review, so a low grade records disclosure the vendor has not published rather than a capability it has been shown to lack.
Source: AI Health Index, July 2026
Questions buyers ask
Should we choose BrainCheck or Linus Health?
On the axes where the AI Health Index separates them, BrainCheck grades higher on several axes, including Autonomy and Oversight Model, HIPAA and BAA Posture and Security Certifications and Trust Center, and Linus Health grades higher on several axes, including AI Centrality, Model and Technology Transparency and Model Supply Chain Disclosure. Linus Health leads on the greater share of scored axes, but the split means the decision turns on which constraint is binding rather than on an overall winner.
Where do BrainCheck and Linus Health differ most?
The widest separation the AI Health Index records between BrainCheck and Linus Health is on Commercial Transparency, where BrainCheck grades A and Linus Health grades C. That axis sits in the Commercial group, so it should carry the most weight for a buyer whose binding constraint is contracting, scope and what the price actually covers.
Where do BrainCheck and Linus Health grade the same?
The AI Health Index grades BrainCheck and Linus Health the same on several axes, including Clinical and Operational Evidence, FDA and Regulatory Status and EHR and Interoperability Depth. Neither holds an advantage the index can evidence on those axes, so they should not carry weight in a selection between these two.
What have BrainCheck and Linus Health not disclosed?
At the last review, at least one of BrainCheck and Linus Health published thin or absent detail on Model Supply Chain Disclosure. The AI Health Index treats an absent disclosure as a gap in the public record rather than a failure of the product, so these are the axes to get in writing during diligence instead of inferring from the grade.
Related comparisons
Other published head to head assessments involving these vendors or their closest peers. The full set for this category is on the Clinical Decision Support page.
This is the clearest AI centrality contrast in the category: BrainCheck is a digitised, normed battery graded C, Linus analyses drawing and speech behaviour with a machine learning model graded A, and this index treats the second as what a genuinely AI native cognitive assessment looks like. The trade is scope certainty. BrainCheck's strong evidence maps exactly to what it is cleared to do.
Linus grades A on evidence and governance, but its cleared indication is cognitive assessment while its commercially significant claim is now amyloid and p-tau217 status prediction, a different and more consequential intended use, and much of that biomarker work appears as AAIC and CTAD conference abstracts rather than full papers, so a buyer must establish which claims fall inside the clearance. Neither publishes a security attestation or a BAA. BrainCheck runs on any tablet; Linus requires an iPad with Apple Pencil.