This article mainly discusses the problem for adaptive event-triggered H∞ state estimation of semi-Markovian jump neural networks (s-MJNNs) subject to random sensor nonlinearity. To reduce the communication load, adaptive event-triggered scheme (AETS) is introduced to decide whether to transmit sampled data or not. Also, considering the possible sensor nonlinearity, a new estimation error model is established under the framework of AETS. An appropriate Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional (LKF) containing the proposed adaptive event trigger condition is constructed, and sufficient conditions are obtained to guarantee the asymptotic stability of the estimation error system. Then, through a set of feasible linear matrix inequalities (LMIs), the co-design method of estimator and AETS is proposed. Finally, the feasibility of this paper is proved by three numerical examples.