We Tried the Best AI Role-play chatbots on the Market in 2024

March 20, 2024

Helpful Summary

Overview: We review six of the best roleplay AI chatbots for companionship, entertainment, and story creation.
Why you can trust us: We have first-hand experience building (and using) AI chatbots, and have a deep understanding of what makes a good one.
Why it matters: Roleplay AI chatbots offer users a unique, immersive experience that can be both fun and therapeutic.
Action points: Our top picks are DreamGen, Janitor AI, Character AI, Venus Chub AI, Yodayo Tavern, and Spicy Chat.
Further research: Check out our guide to the best AI story generators for more recommendations.

Looking for the Best AI Chatbots for Roleplay?

Just a few years ago, chatbots were pretty “dumb.” Conversations with Cleverbot were fun for a few minutes, but the randomness and lack of depth quickly became tiresome.

Fast-forward to today and AI role-play chatbots can create immersive and engaging experiences that surprise, entertain, and even offer therapeutic value. The biggest problem now is finding the right option out of the hundreds of chatbots available.

That's where we come in.

In this DreamGen guide, we’ve researched and tested tons of options to bring you our top picks for the best AI chatbots for roleplay. So whether you want to enhance your creative writing skills, relax with an interactive story, or simply have some fun, these are the chatbots you need to try out.

Let’s dive in.

Why Listen To Us?

At DreamGen, we’re trying to build the ideal platform for AI role-play. We’re not just passionate about open-source AI models, but also about advancing the use of chatbots for creative storytelling, fun, and personal growth.

We’ve developed, tested, and used dozens of AI roleplay tools. And in this guide, we’re helping you skip the trial and error by sharing our top picks for AI chatbots that excel in roleplaying.

So, stick around for a comprehensive breakdown of each chatbot and why it deserves a spot on our list.

What Are Roleplay AI Chatbots?

AI chatbots are programs designed to mimic human conversation. Roleplay AI chatbots are specifically designed to assume the role of a character in a scene, story, or game. They use NLP to understand user inputs and adapt their responses to keep the story consistent and engaging.

Here’s an example from DreamGen.

In this scene, the AI assumes the role of Zoro (from the One Piece anime) and engages in a role-play with the user (playing as a character they’ve defined). The chatbot stays in character while adapting to the user's responses to create a unique, immersive experience.

These chatbots can be used for all kinds of purposes, including:

SFW entertainment (and NSFW, if supported)
Companionship
Role-playing games
Interactive storytelling
Language learning and practice

While NSFW AI chatbots tend to be the most popular, a huge subsection of users enjoy more innocent and lighthearted interactions. That’s why, at DreamGen, we like to think of ourselves as “unrestricted” rather than “NSFW.”

Your role-plays and stories with our chatbots are completely up to you and your imagination.

Criteria To Consider When Choosing Roleplay AI Chatbots

Learning and Adaptability: Roleplay is at its most fun when you feel like you're really engaging with another character. A good roleplay AI chatbot should be able to recognize patterns and respond accordingly, as well as learn from previous interactions to enhance the conversation.
Customization Options: It’s important to be able to customize characters. Some chatbots allow for detailed customization, including setting personalities, backgrounds, and physical appearance, making the role-play more engaging and personalized.
Content and Age Appropriateness: Considering the content type and ensuring age-appropriate interactions are vital. Some platforms may feature NSFW content or require age verification.

6 Best Roleplay AI Chatbots on the Market

DreamGen
Janitor AI
Character AI
Venus Chub AI
Yodayo Tavern
Spicy Chat

1. DreamGen

DreamGen is an AI role-playing and story-writing platform that offers an unrestricted, interactive experience.

Our open-source models are designed to support full creative freedom, cohesive storylines, and deep character development. We offer a selection of pre-defined characters, plus the ability to define your own during scenario setup.

While role-playing, you can take full control over where the story is heading—or you can take a back seat and let the model generate the plot twists. Our goal is to let you decide how involved you want to be in the role-play process.

Key Features

Unfiltered Role-Play: We don’t impose any restrictions on the type of role-plays you can have on DreamGen.
Full Customization: Access a wide range of settings that let you control everything from randomness to response length.
Steer the Role-Play: Guide the AI by specifying character actions, plot progression, or desired writing style, putting you in control of the story's direction.
Autopilot: Let the AI take the reins, guiding the dialogue and behavior of other characters (even your own), for a more laid-back and immersive experience.
API Access: Access DreamGen’s models through whatever frontend you prefer—whether it’s SillyTavern or Kobold.

Pricing

DreamGen has a generous free plan that lets anyone start role-playing right away.

We also offer three paid plans—Starter ($7.83/month), Advanced ($19.35/month), and Pro ($48.30/month. Higher-tier plans offer more monthly completion credits and larger context window sizes, as well as unlimited access to the fastest models.

All plans are 50% off for your first month.

Pros

Role-play and story-writing modes.
Tons of customization options.
Custom, open-source models.
Intuitive character creation.
Powerful story steering features.

Cons

Not many built-in characters & scenarios yet.

2. Janitor AI

Janitor AI is a platform that allows users to create and share chatbots that role-play as different characters. There are thousands available—from recognizable characters like Miles Morales to fully original user-created characters.

Key Features

Character Library: Chat with thousands of chatbots that embody different characters and scenarios.
Unrestricted Chats: Chat about pretty much everything without bumping into content restrictions and model guardrails.
Model Options: Use JanitorAI’s custom LLM or models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and DreamGen via their APIs.

Pricing

Janitor AI is completely free to use, but lots of premium LLMs charge based on usage.

Pros

Offers a huge library of characters.
Completely free to use.
Simple but intuitive UI.

Cons

Limited character customization depth.
Huge range in character quality.
Generations are often slow.

3. Character AI

Character AI (or C.AI) is a popular platform for building and sharing roleplay-focused AI chatbots.

Unlike Janitor AI, Character AI is fully SFW—it’s designed to facilitate more story- and character-driven role-plays that are appropriate for all ages. And just like Janitor AI, there are thousands of characters to choose from.

Key Features

User-Created Characters: Supports a massive community of chatbot builders and users with a wide range of characters to choose from.
Persona Customization: Lets users create multiple “personas” (basically player characters) to use in role-plays.
Image Upload & Generation: Allows users to upload images of characters and generate images via chat.

Pricing

Character.ai offers both free and premium options. The free version gives you unlimited access to their models, but you’ll need to queue for popular bots. C.ai+ costs $9.99/month and offers priority access to all bots, faster generation times, and more.

Pros

Massive selection of user-created characters.
Simple, easy-to-use interface.
Allows for image generation.

Cons

Models are restricted.
Wait times for popular bots can be long.
Not a ton of room for customization.

4. Venus Chub AI

Venus Chub AI is a very similar platform to Janitor AI—you’ll even see a lot of the same bots on both sites. The main difference is that Venus Chub AI offers many more settings for customizing the chat experience, including generation length, randomness, and so on.

Key Features

Chat Customization: Customize your chat experience by changing the color scheme or background picture and decent control over model outputs through lore and memory features.
Active Community: Engage with the community through likes, reviews, sharing chats and large Discord server.
Unrestricted Models: Supports restricted models like GPT but also custom unrestricted models that allow for NSFW chats.

Pricing

Venus Chub AI is a paid platform.

Plans start with Mercury ($5/month) and go up to Mars ($20/month), which includes a 70B parameter model and 8,000 tokens of memory. There’s also a tier above Mars in the works that looks to be aimed at businesses that want to use the AI model.

Pros

Great social aspects.
Simple interface for discovering characters and chatting.
Selection of different models.
Over 50000 different characters to choose from.

Cons

No free trial.
Limited character / scenario editor.
Interface looks a bit dated.

5. Yodayo Tavern

Yodayo Tavern is part of Yodayo—a creative platform for anime enthusiasts. It lets users converse with a wide range of user-generated characters via a clean, modern UI. Most of the characters are NSFW role-plays, but you can also find some more SFW options if you look hard enough.

Key Features

Extensive Character Ensemble: Choose from thousands of different characters or create your own.
Customizable Settings: Adjust font size, background color, and other preferences to personalize your experience.
Diverse Scenarios: Offers a broad spectrum of conversational scenarios, from epic adventures to heartfelt discussions.

Pricing

The pricing options for Yodachi subscriptions range from $5.99 to $39.99 per month. Users can choose from plans that offer varying benefits, like unlimited chatting, image generation, and monthly beans.

Pros

Generally good conversation quality.
Provides a wide range of scenarios and characters (mostly NSFW, though).
Great UI and image generation.

Cons

Plans get expensive.
Limited free trial options.

6. SpicyChat

SpicyChat AI is a platform designed to transform the adult entertainment industry by leveraging advanced AI technology. It's a web-based NSFW chatbot service that enables users to create virtual characters and engage in explicit conversations without censorship.

Key Features

Character Creation: Create your own chatbot characters, including avatars, names, titles, greetings, and personality traits.
OpenAI Integration: Use the OpenAI API to give your characters more human-like responses and intelligence.
Scenario Options: Choose from a variety of erotic scenarios to engage in with your chatbot characters.

Pricing

SpicyChat is free to use, but using the platform for free means long waiting times (10 minutes at the time of writing). If you want to skip the queue, you can upgrade to a paid plan—Get a Taste ($/month), True Supporter ($14.95/month), and I’m All In ($24.95/month).

These paid plans also offer nice extras like larger context memory and access to better models.

Pros

Free to use.
Lots of NSFW AI roleplays.
Paid plans are reasonably priced.

Cons

Waiting times for free can be very long.
Limited options for customizing characters.

Conclusion

And that’s the end of our review of the six best roleplay AI chatbots on the market.

We covered a lot of ground in this guide, so hopefully we were able to introduce you to a few new chatbots that you can use for your roleplay needs. There are tons more out there, but these are the ones that we feel offer the best experience, value, and variety.

Looking for an option that combines AI role-play with AI story-writing? DreamGen is designed to do just that—making it a great choice for anyone interested in creating engaging, dynamic roleplay scenarios.

Try DreamGen now for free and see for yourself!