Relationships with AI companions—once the domain of science-fiction films like Spike Jonze’s Her—are becoming increasingly common. The popular Reddit community “My Boyfriend is AI” has over 37,000 members, and that’s typically only the people who want to talk publicly about their relationships. As Big Tech rolls out increasingly lifelike chatbots and mainstream AI companies such as xAI and OpenAI either offer or are considering allowing erotic conversations, they could be about to become even more common.
The phenomenon isn’t just cultural—it’s commercial, with AI companionship becoming a lucrative, largely unregulated market. Most psychotherapists raise an eyebrow, voicing concerns that emotional dependence on products built by profit-driven companies could lead to isolation, worsening loneliness, and a reliance on over-sycophantic, frictionless relationships.
An OpenAI spokesperson told Fortune that the company is closely monitoring interactions like this because they highlight important issues as AI systems move toward more natural, human-like communication. They added that OpenAI trains its models to clearly identify themselves as artificial intelligence and to reinforce that distinction for users.
