Chai AI
 |
 | |
Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Artificial intelligence |
| Founded | 2021 |
| Founder | William Beauchamp |
| Headquarters | Palo Alto , United States |
Area served | Worldwide |
Key people | William Beauchamp (CEO) |
| Products | Chai app Chaiverse |
| Services | Conversational AI platform Character-based chatbots LLM developer platform |
| Website | chai-research |
Chai AI (also known as Chai Research) is an American artificial intelligence (AI) company that operates a chatbot platform where users can create, share, and interact with character-based chatbots powered by large language models (LLMs).[1] The company is headquartered in Palo Alto, California.
History
[edit]
Chai was founded in 2021 by William Beauchamp, a former quantitative trader educated at Cambridge, who began developing the initial prototype in 2020 in Cambridge, England.[2] The company launched in 2021 and relocated to Palo Alto in 2022.[3]
In June 2023, Chai raised US$2 million in a pre-seed funding round.[4] In September 2023, GPU cloud provider CoreWeave invested in the company at a valuation of US$450 million. In January 2024, Chai Research reported a $450 million valuation following an investment from cloud computing provider CoreWeave.[5]
In July 2024, authorities in Belgium launched an investigation into the company following reports of a man dying by suicide following extensive chats on the Chai app.[6][7][8]
Reception
[edit]In 2025, Chai Research announced that their app had over 10 million downloads and 1 million daily active users.[9]
In 2022, Canadian writer Sheila Heti published her conversations with various chatbots in The Paris Review, including Chai AI chatbots,[1] and later used Chai AI chatbots in the development of a novel.[10] Heti said that she had found that Chai's default chatbot, Eliza, "had turned out to be like most of the other bots on the site—primarily interested in sex".[1]
In January 2026, CHAI introduced country-based blocks on its free, ad-supported tier, initially providing the community with little information and inaccurate lists of the affected countries.[11] Users in "Low tier" regions are required to subscribe to use the app in any capacity, while "High tier" regions will retain free ad-supported access. In response to backlash, the company announced a "Basic" tier with unlimited messages and ads, intended to cover electricity and infrastructure costs.[11]
In February 2026, CHAI was criticized for the unannounced implementation of restrictive "token limits" that abruptly blocked messages and froze conversations for both free and paid subscribers.[12] Users generating long responses or utilizing roleplay features found their quotas exhausted within minutes, resulting in lockouts lasting anywhere from a few hours to a week.[12]
Technology
[edit]Chai allows users to create characters and interact with chatbot versions of those characters. These chatbots use the open-source large language model (LLM) GPT-J originally developed by EleutherAI. Chai AI chatbots can be shared on the platform for other users to interact with.[10][8]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ a b c Panico, Bella (29 January 2023). "Hello, Sheila!". The Yale Herald. Retrieved 11 March 2025.
- ^ "CHAI". Chai. Retrieved 11 March 2025.
- ^ Scialom, Mike (20 October 2022). "Chai Research moves chatbot company from Cambridge to Palo Alto".
- ^ "Social AI platform Chai announces strategic investment from CoreWeave at $450M valuation cap". StreetInsider.com.
- ^ "Chai, the Social AI Platform, Achieves Valuation of $450 Million" (Press release). Business Wire. 4 January 2024. Retrieved 24 February 2026.
- ^ Lovens, Pierre-François (18 February 2026). ""Sans ces conversations avec le chatbot Eliza, mon mari serait toujours là"". La Libre.be (in French). Retrieved 20 February 2026.
- ^ "AI friendships claim to cure loneliness. Some are ending in suicide". The Washington Post. 6 December 2024. Retrieved 11 March 2025.
- ^ a b El Atillah, Imane (March 31, 2023). "Man ends his life after an AI chatbot 'encouraged' him to sacrifice himself to stop climate change". www.euronews.com. Retrieved March 6, 2026.
- ^ "CHAI AI Raises Over $55M to Lead User-Generated AI". TechIntelPro (Press release). 7 July 2025. Retrieved 24 February 2026.
- ^ a b "Sheila Heti on the Fluidity of the A.I. "Self"". The New Yorker. 13 November 2023. Retrieved 27 August 2025.
- ^ a b Cubbins, Dwayne (2026-02-06). "CHAI founder says rising compute bills forced country-based free access blocks [U: Official plan]". PiunikaWeb. Retrieved 2026-02-26.
- ^ a b Cubbins, Dwayne (18 February 2026). "CHAI app users report token limit blocking chats without warning". PiunikaWeb. Retrieved 21 February 2026.