Character AI logotype seen on smartphone screen. Blurred Character.AI website on the background. Shutterstock/ Ascannio.

Character.ai, the 16z-backed AI chatbot start-up from former Google AI researchers was released today (11 Oct) with a new group chat feature on its iOS and Android apps.

The platform, which allows users to customise AI companions with unique personalities, now allows for group chats made up of real users and AI characters.

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The feature will first be available to c.ai+ subscribers, which costs $9.99 per month. The feature will later become open to the public after feedback from subscribers.

Character.AI proposes the new feature could be used to host a discussion on politics with ‘Napoleon, Athena, Genghis Khan, and Julius Caesar’ or explore ‘how would a conversation go between a weathered NYC Cat, a ferocious lion, and a small squirrel?’

The start-up also emphasises the educational potential of the feature as a tool for language practice or for book recommendations.

Character.AI is not the first to introduce a group chat function: Meta allows users to call a series of AI hosts based on celebrities like MrBeast, Tom Brady and Snoop Dog, while Snapchat’s My AI feature can be added to group chats.

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Character.ai surpassed 1.7 million downloads within a week of its release in March and is catching up with ChatGPT, according to web analytics company Similarweb.

OpenAI’s generative AI chatbot, ChatGPT, saw monthly traffic to its website decline in June for the first time since its launch in November 2022.

Total monthly visits during 2023 declined to 1.6 billion visits in June from 1.75 billion visits in April and 1.8 billion visits in May.