LAS VEGAS – Lovense, the company that has, let’s be frank, pretty much mastered the dark arts of the internet-connected sex toy, has now apparently decided the next big thing is the human heart – or at least a rather convincing stand-in for it. At CES 2026, the erotic tech titan pulled out all the stops to unveil its AI Companion Doll, a startlingly lifelike robot engineered to tackle the modern plague of loneliness, and is already shaking down eager punters for a tidy £160 (approx. $200) just to join the queue.
Running on what Lovense, with a straight face, terms an “adaptive AI,” the doll vows to engage in sparkling repartee, recall your most awkward past interactions (great for building character!), and even pull off “lifelike facial expressions” thanks to a complex ballet of servos in its noggin. The grand ambition, according to the official spiel, is to dish out emotional, mental, and intimate engagement that, rather like a fine wine or a particularly stubborn stain, evolves over time. And, in a plot twist that would shock precisely zero sentient beings, it “integrates effortlessly with the full Lovense ecosystem” of other connected devices. Because why just have one internet-connected intimate gadget when you can have a whole network, eh?
This venture into AI companionship marks a cracking pivot from the sheer delights of teledildonics to… well, teledildonics with a rather fancy therapy license attached. The company insists this doll is just the ticket for users to shore up their confidence and, crucially, better prepare them for the terrifying prospect of engaging with actual, flesh-and-blood humans. Of course, whether shunting off one’s emotional heavy lifting onto a silicon-based companion is a genuine balm for the lonely soul or merely a rather expensive, high-tech plaster slapped over a gaping societal gash remains a cracking good pub debate, especially when one considers if Robots won't end us, they'll just cuddle us to death .
Why is this important?
Lovense’s entry into the AI companion market is a rather telling harbinger of the grand convergence between the erotic tech industry and the rapidly blossoming AI relationship arena – a market segment that’s apparently set to balloon at a compound annual growth rate north of 30%. While companies have been hawking chatbot “girlfriends” for donkey’s years, bolting a fully conversational AI onto a physical, expressive body, then wiring it into a whole network of haptic devices? That, my friends, is a smashing new level of immersive tech, bordering on the utterly bonkers. It also lobs a fair few thorny ethical grenades, not least the rather sticky wicket of emotional dependency on machines, the decidedly dodgy realm of data privacy in our most intimate moments (especially considering Lovense’s historical security blips), and the overarching poser of whether these “companions” are truly a leg-up or merely a giant tripping hazard for genuine human connection.
