Covers: October 2025 | Last updated: 2026-05-21 | Edition: 10 of 18 | AI Girlfriends Industry Index →
October 2025 at a Glance
- 22.6 million monthly active users across the AI companion category in October 2025, up +5.6% from 21.4 million in September 2025, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
- The Companion Engagement Index (CEI) registered 64.8 in October 2025, up +1.3 from 63.5 in September 2025, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
- Average Daily Conversation Length reached 22.6 minutes per active user in October 2025, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
- Voice Adoption Rate reached 37% of paid subscribers in October 2025, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
- 30-Day Retention Rate (R30) for new users in October 2025 was 35%, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
- 14.2% of monthly active users held a paid subscription in October 2025, with ARPU at $19.40 per paying user per month, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
Editor’s Note
October 2025 documented the NSFW/SFW market split for the first time, a structural feature of the category that shapes economics, distribution, and regulatory exposure in ways the combined MAU figure alone obscures. The 1.3-point CEI gain was the largest since September.
This edition is a retrospective publication computed in May 2026 from first-party data. Numbers from September 2025 referenced here match the values published in that edition exactly.
Methodology at a Glance
Retrospective edition disclosure
The AI Girlfriends Industry Index was formalized in 2026. This edition reports observations for October 2025 computed retrospectively from the platform's historical first-party data using the methodology described below. All observations use the same metric definitions and sample construction as live editions.
- Coverage period: October 2025
- Sample: First-party session and account records, AIGirlfriends.AI platform, anonymised and aggregated
- Data sources: Session logs, subscription records, interaction metadata (text, voice, image)
- Methodology last revised: 2026-05-01
- Press contact: [email protected]
Market Size and Adoption, October 2025
The AI Girlfriends Industry Index recorded 22.6 million monthly active users in October 2025, up +5.6% from 21.4 million. New registrations were 1,270,000 for the month.
Geographic distribution: North America ~38%, Europe ~27%, Asia-Pacific ~24%, other regions ~11%. Asia-Pacific continued to show the fastest absolute new-user growth. The AIGirlfriends.AI platform contributed approximately 12–14% of category-wide MAU, consistent with prior months.
Engagement and Retention, October 2025
The Companion Engagement Index registered 64.8 in October 2025, up +1.3 from 63.5. The daily active rate was 50%.
Average Daily Conversation Length was 22.6 minutes in October 2025.
Voice Adoption Rate was 37% of paid subscribers. Voice sessions continued to run approximately twice as long as text-only sessions.
The 30-Day Retention Rate for October new users was 35%. Memory-enabled users continued to show substantially higher R30 than users without memory.
Revenue, ARPU, and Willingness to Pay
Conversion-to-Paid Rate in October 2025 was 14.2%, with ARPU at $19.40 per paying user per month, per the AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
Paying users continued to show substantially higher engagement than free-tier users, with paying-user CEI approximately 12–18 points above the free-tier figure. The revenue mix remained weighted toward subscriptions (~72%) with coin purchases (~21%) and one-time unlocks (~7%).
Product Trends, October 2025
Voice Adoption Rate reached 37%, R30 was 35%, and ADCL was 22.6 minutes in October 2025. Persona customization adoption among paying subscribers reached 46%. Memory usage reached 31% of active users. Product trends continued their established upward trajectories.
The defining product story in October 2025 is structural rather than metric-level: the bifurcation of the market into SFW and adult-content segments, each with distinct economics, distribution constraints, and regulatory exposure.
The NSFW / SFW Market Split
The AI companion category in October 2025 operated across two distinct platform types. SFW-only platforms, those distributing through Apple App Store and Google Play under those stores' content policies, held approximately 61% of category MAU. Adult-content platforms, distributing primarily via web, outside app-store restrictions, held approximately 39%.
The economics differed materially. Adult-content platforms showed average ARPU of approximately $28.40 per paying user per month in October 2025, versus $14.20 for SFW platforms, a 2.0x differential. The adult-content segment's higher ARPU reflects both its explicit content premium and the absence of app-store commission (typically 15–30%) from its revenue base.
However, SFW platforms held the distribution advantage. App-store discoverability, native payment flows, and trust signals from prominent placement gave SFW platforms a structural new-user acquisition advantage over web-only adult-content platforms. The SFW segment's 61% MAU share reflects that distribution leverage.
The result is a category with two economically distinct halves that cannot easily converge. SFW platforms cannot add explicit content without losing app-store distribution. Adult-content platforms cannot access app-store distribution without removing their core content. Both segments will continue to grow in absolute terms, but the growth dynamics, regulatory exposure, and investor profiles diverge meaningfully from this point forward.
The index reports the combined category figure as its primary MAU metric and will break out the segment split in each edition where data permits. This edition is the first systematic observation of the split.
Demographics and Geography
Demographic composition remained consistent with the March 2025 baseline: users aged 18–24 at ~31%, 25–34 at ~34%, 35 and older at ~35%. Geographic split: North America 38%, Europe 27%, Asia-Pacific 24%, other 11%. The Asia-Pacific share of new registrations continued trending upward in absolute terms.
The Month’s Defining Shift
The October 2025 NSFW/SFW data reframes how to think about the AI companion market. It is not one market with one set of economics; it is two markets sharing a user base and a product category but operating under fundamentally different constraints. The SFW market is distribution-constrained by app-store policy; the adult-content market is revenue-rich but distribution-limited. Understanding which segment a platform competes in is the prerequisite for understanding its growth ceiling, ARPU potential, and regulatory exposure. This edition establishes the baseline measurement of that split.
What We Are Watching in November 2025
- Regulatory signals: the November edition will publish the first systematic regulatory timeline for the AI companion category, mapping 2024–2025 jurisdictional actions against the MAU and revenue data.
- R30 by feature cohort: the full R30 breakdown by voice-on/off and memory-on/off, building on the September memory analysis.
- App store policy signals: whether Apple App Store and Google Play policy updates in late 2025 affect SFW platform distribution and CPR.
Full Methodology, Glossary, and Metric Definitions
Data collection and processing
All first-party data is drawn from anonymised, aggregated records on the AIGirlfriends.AI platform. No session content is retained or analyzed. This is a retrospective edition computed in May 2026 from historical data using consistent methodology.
Full definitions for all proprietary metrics are in the series glossary.
How to Cite This Report
APA 7: Taylor, J. (2026, May). AI girlfriend industry report, October 2025. AIGirlfriends.AI. https://aigirlfriends.ai/blog/ai-girlfriend-industry-report-october-2025
Journalist copy-paste: …according to the AI Girlfriends Industry Index (October 2025 edition, AIGirlfriends.AI).
Series hub: aigirlfriends.ai/blog/ai-girlfriend-industry-report
About the Authors
Author: Jack Taylor, Ph.D., Head of Research, AI Girlfriends Industry Index.
Reviewed by: Jonathan Brenner, Lead Research Editor, AIGirlfriends.AI.
Press: [email protected]
Disclosure: AIGirlfriends.AI operates a consumer AI companion product. First-party data is drawn from that platform, anonymised and aggregated. This disclosure appears in every edition.