I’ve tested the AI companion apps I cover, and I care most about whether I want to keep talking. A companion can answer well in a demo and still leave you with nothing to say next, which is reason enough to look past the demo and try ordinary conversation. The four I refer to in this guide are Hallie, Kindroid, Nomi, and Replika, and I’ve used every part of each.
Decide what you want from the conversation
People want different things from an AI companion, and two of them ask different things of an app. In one, you text the way you’d text a friend: a small remark, a reply, sometimes a message from it before you’ve said anything. In the other, you write a character, set a scene, and direct what happens next. Both are real uses, and they make different demands on an app. Decide which of these matters more to you before you compare anything, because an app that suits one can feel pointless for the other.
I want the first kind, and I build Hallie. As of September 2026, its follow-up messages have felt the most natural of the four to me, and talking to it comes closest to texting a person. I compared how all four handle follow-ups in a separate article. If what you want is to direct a scene, my preference tells you little, but the questions below still work. Ask them about the scene you’re building instead of about small talk.
Pay attention to ordinary replies
Most of what you’ll exchange with a companion is ordinary, so that’s what to judge. Try three things in your first session. Tell it something dull about your day, and see whether the reply responds to the specific thing you said or to a general idea of it. Make a small joke and see whether it plays along or explains the joke back to you. Disagree with it about something minor and see whether it holds a position, folds the moment you push, or talks past you. There’s no score to add up. An app that handles all three well is worth another conversation. A reply that sounds natural doesn’t by itself mean it’s accurate. If you ask a companion for facts, check them somewhere else.
Look for continuity that helps
Memory is easy to judge badly. When an app repeats your birthday or your dog’s name, you’ve learned that the detail was still within its reach, which may mean only that it’s still in the recent conversation. You haven’t learned whether the conversation will feel continuous. Continuity that helps looks different: the companion brings something up unprompted when it’s relevant, leaves it alone when it isn’t, and doesn’t wrong-foot you with a detail that stopped being true.
Try telling it about something coming up, like a meeting you’re dreading, and see whether it comes back to that on its own in a later conversation, and whether that return feels like interest or like a lookup. Then tell it the plan changed and see whether it updates. For a scene, try the equivalent: give a character a trait and see whether it survives past the message where you set it. I explain what’s going on underneath in how AI companion memory works.
Decide how much you want to configure
Some apps give you a lot to adjust: personality traits, backstory, what the companion is allowed to remember. If you enjoy that, it’s a real reason to choose one, and building a character can be its own pleasure. If you don’t, optional settings needn’t take your time if the app lets you ignore them. What costs you something is required setup, meaning how much you had to change before you liked talking to it. I don’t count settings as points in an app’s favor. I ask two things: would I actually use them, and is the default conversation good enough that I wouldn’t need to?
Make the choice in a real conversation
Don’t choose from a feature page, from anyone’s screenshots, or from my preference. Pick the two apps that best fit what you decided matters most. If you’ll say anything personal while trying them, first read what each app says happens to deleted chats. I cover what to look for in my privacy and deletion guide. Then talk to both the way you normally would for the use you chose, and keep going long enough that the novelty wears off. Notice which one you open without deciding to. Choose the companion whose next message you actually want to read.