Is the AI character chat app market growing or shrinking?
Miles FosterOwner and tester, RankDude
The answer▲ Growingbut visits without DeepAI are down 9% on a year ago
- Visits, year on year, without DeepAI
- -9.0%
- Visits, last six months
- +77%
- Name searches vs October 2025
- +5.3%
Every month I add up the Google visits to the 17 AI character chat app sites I track (DataForSEO estimates) and how often people in the US search for them by name (Google Ads). In October 2026 they got about 32 million visits. Much of the year’s change is one site, DeepAI; without it, visits are down 9% on a year ago.
The total hides very different stories: one site grew 3185% in a year while another lost 80% of its visits. See who grew and who shrank, the visits month by month and the name searches, plus what I expect for November 2026.
AI character chat app market demand: key numbers, October 2026
Four numbers for October 2026. Visits mean visits from Google search to the 17 tracked sites. Tap one for the detail below.
- Visits from Google32Mvisits+76% vs a year ago
- Name searches, US2.2Msearches+5% vs October 2025
- Top five sites98.9%of visitsfastest grower: Candy AI
- Expected in November33Mvisitslikely 23M to 42M
- The AI character chat app market is growing as of October 2026, but visits without DeepAI are down 9% on a year ago.
- The 17 AI character chat app sites RankDude tracks got 32,486,123 visits from Google search in October 2026, 76% more visits than in October 2025, or 9% fewer without DeepAI.
- People in the US searched Google for these sites by name 2,207,160 times in September 2026, 5% more searches than in October 2025.
- The five most-visited AI character chat app sites get 98.9% of all visits.
- Fastest-growing AI character chat app site over the year: Candy AI, +3185% (18.1K to 596K visits a month).
- Steepest fall over the year: Dippy, -80% (164K to 32.5K visits a month).
- Forecast for November 2026: about 33M visits, likely between 23M and 42M.
Source: DataForSEO visit estimates and Google Ads search data, published 2 November 2026 by RankDude.
1.Are more people visiting AI character chat app sites than a year ago?
Up 76% on a year ago; about level with September 2026 (+3%)
Only because of DeepAI. The 17 tracked AI character chat app sites got 32,486,123 visits from Google search in October 2026. That is 76% more visits than in October 2025, or 9% fewer without DeepAI, and about the same as in September 2026.
October 2026 is the highest month of the last two years. In the US, visits were 3,965,252, down 23% on a year ago.
WorldVisits a month to AI character chat app sites, worldwide, two years
Source: DataForSEO, Google search visits, all tracked sites.
Worldwide, this month
32M
+76.0% on a year ago
United States, this month
4.0M
-23.0% on a year ago
Two-year high
32M
October 2026
US share of visits
12.2%
of worldwide visits
Miles explains
More visits than a year ago means new people are still finding AI character chat app sites through Google. Most of that growth is one site, DeepAI; without it, visits are down 9% on a year ago.
2.Are people searching for AI character chat app sites by name?
Up 5% on October 2025; 2.2M name searches a month in the US
Yes, more than before. People in the US searched Google for the names of the counted AI character chat app sites 2,207,160 times in September 2026, 5% more searches than in October 2025. Someone who searches a site’s name already knows it, so this is the clearest sign of people coming back on purpose. The term “ai character chat” itself gets about 40,500 US searches a month (Google Ads, 12-month average).
USName searches a month for AI character chat app sites, US
Source: Google Ads via DataForSEO, to September 2026.
USMost searched AI character chat app sites by name, searches a month
Miles explains
Name searches are up 5%. This number does not change when Google reshuffles its results, so it is the most reliable sign of growth on this page.
3.Which AI character chat app sites grew, and which shrank?
The five most-visited sites hold 98.9% of all visits; the ten most-visited hold 99.7%
The five most-visited AI character chat app sites get 98.9% of all visits, so one of them winning or losing a big Google ranking moves the whole total. Fastest grower over the year: Candy AI, from 18,141 to 595,949 visits (+3185%). Steepest fall: Dippy, from 164,183 to 32,456 visits (-80%).
Growing fastest, year on year
Source: DataForSEO. Sites with 5,000+ visits a year ago.