AI Companion Research
Original editorial research on the AI companion category. Research is analytical and explanatory — how the technology works, what shapes the category, where privacy and design tradeoffs sit. For head-to-head platform tests, see the Lab.
Published research
A technical explainer on how modern AI companion apps implement long-term memory, and why it varies so much across platforms.
Read →Why AI companion characters drift, and what serious platforms do to keep the same persona stable across models and time.
Read →A practical checklist for evaluating the privacy posture of any AI companion app before you subscribe.
Read →A honest survey of what modern AI companion apps actually support in 2026 — memory, images, video, voice, character creation.
Read →The distinctions that matter — how AI companions differ from chatbots and virtual assistants in design, memory and intent.
Read →How research differs from testing
Research is our editorial analysis of how the AI companion category actually works — technology, tradeoffs, patterns. It can be published from public information plus editorial judgment. Testing lives in the Lab and requires hands-on use of each platform against a structured methodology. We keep them separate so a reader always knows which they're reading.
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