Augmental today announces the public US launch of the MouthPad, its tongue-driven computer mouse, and, at the same time, releases a beta of its “invisible keyboard,” VOX.
First offered through an Early Access program in 2024, the MouthPad is a hands-free Bluetooth mouse that lets people control phones, tablets, and computers with tongue, head, and sip gestures. It is used today by more than 100 people living with mobility challenges, including students, artists, and gamers, some for up to 16 hours a day.
“I game better, work faster, and life’s just easier. Best of all, when I use my computer, I no longer feel like my limitations hold me back.”
Tomás Baptista, who uses the MouthPad daily as a screener analyst.
Custom-made for each user, the MouthPad fits over the upper teeth, like a slim retainer. A pressure-sensitive trackpad on the palate, paired with head-based motion sensing, enables hands-free cursor control, clicks, swipes, and other gestures, all customizable in the companion app.
Augmental released the second generation earlier this year, expanding the platform beyond the mouse. You can now trigger custom keyboard shortcuts with tongue gestures and remap the trackpad to WASD controls for gameplay and 3D modeling. The new version also runs seven-plus hours on a charge and pairs with several devices at once, with one-button switching.
Baptista recently set a new MouthPad record of 10.47 bits per second in a cursor-control task similar to Webgrid, which measures both speed and accuracy. That matches today’s state-of-the-art implanted brain-computer interfaces, which also give hands-free pointer control but require brain surgery.
The MouthPad is now public for the first time. The waitlist runs past 6,300: surgeons, technicians, pianists, boxers, mechanics, parents, and others who need hands-free control.
Introducing VOX, the invisible keyboard
Behind the scenes, Augmental also built the MouthPad’s other half: VOX, its reimagining of the keyboard.
Inspired by the stethoscope, VOX is a skin-worn microphone pendant that captures sound not only through the air but also through the body. It rejects more ambient noise and background conversations than a conventional microphone, which lets you dictate at much quieter volumes, from a private whisper in a library to low-volume speech in a noisy café.
“I can speak a lot quieter, and with many fewer mistakes, than using the microphone built into the laptop,” says VOX tester and MouthPad user Brian McCarthy, a forest-ecology professor at Ohio University.
VOX also gives you wearable text input. You trigger it with a button, or, paired with the MouthPad, a tongue gesture, to privately dictate a thought, send a message, or talk to AI on the go. It activates only on a deliberate gesture, never listening in the background.
“Technology should meet humans where they are,” says Augmental CEO and co-founder Tomás Vega, “not the other way around.” Vega first felt the need for VOX during a Siri internship at Apple: his stutter, which eases at low volumes, kept him from reliably using speech interfaces. In the voice-AI era, the team hopes VOX can widen access to dictation for people with limited lung function, speech impediments, or hand impairments, including MouthPad users who type by voice. All proceeds from the first batch of the VOX beta fund MouthPads for people who need one.
Toward silent speech
With the MouthPad and VOX working in sync, the team can pursue a longstanding goal in human-computer interaction: fully silent speech. By pairing the sound VOX hears with the tongue-movement patterns the MouthPad senses, they can build a personal speech model that needs no sound at all.
“If you design for those who are the most constrained, you design better interfaces for everybody.”
Tomás Vega, CEO and co-founder.
Together, VOX and the MouthPad form an ecosystem of wearables Augmental calls Skinware: body-coupled interfaces that let people control computers and AI more naturally. They meld with the body instead of sitting on it, unlike today’s pins, glasses, and clip-on wearables, for better signal, comfort, and expression.
VOX is in beta at $200, shipping late 2026. The MouthPad is $1,400, not counting the required dental scan (about $100), and every order ships within six months.