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E05
← Are We Cooked? · All episodes
Season 1 · Episode 05Love
when your best friend is a chatbot…

Are relationships cooked?

May 12, 2026|● ~15 min listen|Solo investigation
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220MAI companion app
downloads by mid-2025
88%Year-over-year
growth
660MUsers on Xiaoice
alone
72%Of US teens have
tried AI companions
The numbers in this episode · Sensor Tower × Common Sense Media 2025
the setup

About this episode.

→ The hook

220 million cumulative downloads of AI companion apps by mid-2025. 88% year-over-year growth. The largest platform, Xiaoice in China, has 660 million users. And 72% of US teens have tried AI companions; a third have chosen AI over humans for serious conversations.

Episode 5 of Are We Cooked? closes Season 1 with the most personal question. Three years ago, AI companions were fringe behaviour. Today it is a movement at unprecedented scale. And nobody is being honest about what it means.

inside the investigation

What this episode covers.

  • The Sensor Tower H1 2025 + Common Sense Media 2025 numbers that expose the real scale
  • The optimist case: AI fills loneliness gaps no human could (Kuyda, El-Kaliouby, Perel, Murthy)
  • The pessimist case: always-agreeable AI rewires us out of real relationships (Turkle, Haidt, Putnam, Kamenetz)
  • What both sides miss, including the gender question nobody is studying
  • The split Anurag is watching with friends, colleagues, kids of friends
  • Three sharper questions about love, friendship, and what intimacy means now
skip around

Chapters.

00:00220 Million Questions▶00:36Meet Your Host▶02:09Why Relationships, Why Right Now▶04:42The Optimist Case▶09:37The Pessimist Case▶10:49What Both Sides Miss▶12:50Are We? You Decide.▶
louder proof

Sources cited.

Sensor Tower H1 2025 AI Apps Report: 220M cumulative AI companion downloads, 88% YoY growth, 700% surge from 2022 to mid-2025
Common Sense Media ‘Talk, Trust, and Trade-Offs’ (2025): 72% of US teens have tried AI companions, 33% chose AI over humans for serious conversations
Replika 25M users; Chai $1.4B valuation; Snapchat My AI 150M users; Xiaoice (China) 660M users
American Psychological Association (2024): 61% of 18-25 year olds report feeling ‘seriously lonely’
US Surgeon General Advisory on the Loneliness Epidemic (2023)
Sherry Turkle, ‘Reclaiming Conversation’; Jonathan Haidt, ‘The Anxious Generation’ (2024); Robert Putnam, ‘Bowling Alone’
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E04 · Meaning
Are Creatives Cooked?
not a hype show. not a doom show…

Don’t miss the next investigation.

Are We Cooked? is a thinking show about what AI is really doing to humans: work, parenting, creativity, relationships. New episodes weekly.

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