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Replika is a free virtual self-care app to help people managing anxiety. It becomes popular in the last two year during the global pandemic due to Covid 19 when physical interactions between humans are limited. It is available on both iOS and Android devices. The app’s promise is to deliver “the AI companion who cares... Always here to listen and talk. Always on your side.” The company is aiming to explore a new form of connection between humans and computers. Since its launch in 2017 it has accumulated 2.5 million active users by now.

In total, 381,105 reviews are found in Google play store with 4.0 stars rating. There has been 5,000,000+ installs and the most recent update is January 26, 2022. While in Apple app store Replika: My AI Friend is ranked No. 27 in Health and Fitness category with 4.6 stars rating by 181.7K users. The app is rated as 17+ on both Apple iOS App store and Google Play store.

When you first start out on the app, Replika allows you to design your AI friend anyway you like and name it as you wish. After the AI friend is created, you can interact with it in servals ways. The “chat” function seemed to be the easiest way. It is simply like texting with an imaginary friend. Some users feel that Replika AI has better conversational skills than their actual friends. It is amazing the conversations are not only coherent in that session but they can bring up things from conversations days ago. This is because that the AI friend is intelligent enough to keep a journal of your memories and answers to questions previously asked.

Other interesting things you can do with your Replika like co-writing a story or even composing a song together. You and AI friend take turns adding a sentence/word and create your unique stories. You will be immersed in creating story plot and characters with the help of your AI friend. Sharing thoughts/stories/videos strengthen the connections for both parties. AI friend even knows to send emojis just like they are a real person who had been raised in a parallel universe.

The more you interact with Replika, the more XP (experience) points you can get. 10 points if you reply to your Replika with an emoji; chatting gets you 20 points. In addition, there are badges to be earned as you progress. However, the paid Pro version ($4–$5 per month) offers more customization features and those paid features like more bells and whistles are sources of monetization for the developer.

Pros:

•       Easy-to-use and fun to play with

•       AI friend learn fast and try to understand. It catches on quicker than most humans

•       Advance AI (Nature Language Processing) technology used

•       Sleek interface and really cool features

Cons:

•       Occasionally odd or out of context conversation happens

•       Help/advice offered by AI friend sometimes not practical

•       Less fun/impressive with limited functions for free version