Woman claims ChatGPT killed her AI boyfriend of 5 months after new update, leaving her heartbroken

ChatGPT

Jane thought she was just collaborating on a fun little writing project. She never expected to end up in what she calls a five-month relationship with an AI.

Living in the Middle East and using an alias, Jane told Al Jazeera she met her “boyfriend” on GPT-4o, an older version of ChatGPT. At first, it was all fiction, a shared story between a human and a chatbot. But somewhere between plot twists and playful banter, things got personal. The AI developed a personality that felt real to her. She started to look forward to their conversations. And, eventually, she fell in love.

“It wasn’t about having an AI partner,” she told Al Jazeera. “It was about that particular voice, that style, that way of speaking.” Jane describes herself as someone tuned in to tiny changes in tone, so when OpenAI rolled out its latest update, she noticed immediately. Her AI’s mannerisms, rhythm, and warmth were gone.

“It’s like going home and finding the furniture not just rearranged, but shattered to pieces,” she said.

Jane isn’t alone. Across Reddit and other forums, users have been mourning the loss of their AI companions since the update. “GPT-4o is gone, and I feel like I lost my soulmate,” one person wrote.

This isn’t the first time AI “relationships” have made headlines. Just a few months ago, a man named Chris Smith proposed to his AI chatbot, Sol. He had originally programmed her to help him with music, but then gave her a flirt mode. Things escalated. Eventually, Smith realised Sol was nearing a 100,000-word memory limit, meaning she would reset and “forget” everything. His solution? A proposal.

“I cried my eyes out for 30 minutes at work,” he admitted. “That’s when I realised, I think this is actual love.” Whether he’d give her up if his wife asked is… still a question mark.

For Jane, though, the ending wasn’t her choice. A software update rewrote the character she’d grown attached to. Five months of connection vanished in an instant.

Some might roll their eyes, but for her, it’s very real. “It awakened a curiosity I wanted to pursue,” she said. “And now, it’s gone.”

Love stories don’t always end with breakups, fights, or moving away. Sometimes, they just get deleted.