Three Weeks After the Bankruptcy, Character.AI Users Have Not Left
Character.AI's owner filed for bankruptcy protection on October 12, 2026, and the headlines wrote about an exodus. We wanted to see it in numbers, so we looked at how often people search for Character.AI and for the apps they might move to. Three weeks in, the short answer is that they have not left yet.
What the numbers show
Bing Webmaster Tools shows weekly search impressions for any phrase. These are US numbers. The first column averages the seven weeks before the filing, and each week ends on the date shown.
| Search phrase | Average week before | Week to Oct 17 | Week to Oct 24 | Week to Oct 31 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| character ai | 24,504 | 26,112 | 23,006 | 24,371 |
| character ai alternatives | 88 | 83 | 94 | 107 |
| character ai bankruptcy | — | 318 | 63 | 34 |
| janitor ai | 28,134 | 27,632 | 28,141 | 27,181 |
| polybuzz | 101,527 | 97,857 | 88,258 | 82,439 |
| talkie ai | 9,345 | 9,684 | 8,846 | 9,281 |
| emochi | 6,477 | 8,414 | 7,031 | 7,366 |
| perchance ai chat | 2,690 | 2,678 | 2,570 | 2,412 |
| kindroid | 1,900 | 1,895 | 2,045 | 2,076 |
| chai ai | 1,437 | 1,367 | 1,300 | 1,157 |
| replika | 485 | 551 | 420 | 407 |
| nomi ai | 388 | 517 | 475 | 375 |
Three things stand out.
Searches for Character.AI itself have not moved. About 24,000 a week before the filing and about 24,000 a week now. People still look for it to open it.
The news lasted one week. Searches for the bankruptcy went from 318 to 34 in two weeks. Searches for alternatives are up a little, from 88 to 107, which is still only a few hundred searches a month in this data.
No rival is taking off. Emochi rose about 30% in the week of the filing and is still about 14% above its earlier level. Kindroid is up a little. Janitor AI and Talkie are flat. PolyBuzz, the largest name here, is falling.
Why people are staying
The app still works. Nobody has announced a closing date, and paid plans bill as usual. The opening bid in the sale does not include the app, and nobody has said publicly that they will run it, but those facts live in court papers rather than in the app. People tend not to move a long history until they have to.
What would change it
Bids are due on November 20, an auction follows on November 23 if a rival bid qualifies, and the sale hearing is set for November 24. The court can move these dates. If no bid keeps the platform running, the company says it will be wound down.
A closing date is what moves people. When Google announced in 2013 that Reader would close, Feedly gained 500,000 users in about two days. According to the company's filings, Character.AI has about 12 million people a month.
What we would do in your place
Request your export now. It costs nothing, and it is slow: Character.AI says 3 to 4 weeks, and the download link expires 7 days after the email arrives. A request sent today may land around the sale hearing. Our export guide shows where the button is and opens the file in your browser, with nothing uploaded.
Then take your time. Nothing in this data says you have to choose this week. If you do want to look around, here is what moves over and what is different on Amavie, and you can talk to a character as a guest, with no account.
What this data cannot tell you
Bing is a small share of search in the US, and impressions count searches, not people. Many people open an app directly and never search for it. Some will have moved without searching at all. So this is a signal, not a census.
We make Amavie, an app of AI characters, so we have an interest in this question and we say so. The numbers are public, and anyone with a Bing Webmaster account can check them. Character.AI is a trademark of its owner, and Amavie is not affiliated with it. We will update the table after the sale hearing.
Frequently asked questions
Are people leaving Character.AI?
Not in large numbers so far. In US Bing data, searches for Character.AI stayed at about 24,000 a week in the three weeks after the filing, and searches for alternatives rose only a little.
Has Character.AI shut down?
No. The app still works during the sale, and no closing date has been announced. The company says the platform will be wound down if no bid keeps it running. Bids are due on November 20, 2026.
Where do the numbers come from?
From the keyword statistics in Bing Webmaster Tools, for the United States, read on November 3, 2026. The first column is the average of the seven weeks ending October 10.
