A Japanese woman has drawn global attention after holding a wedding ceremony with an AI partner she created using ChatGPT, highlighting a growing shift in how intimacy and technology intersect in modern society.
Yurina Noguchi, a 32-year-old call centre operator, says her relationship with the AI—modelled on a video game character named Klaus—developed gradually through daily conversations. What began as casual chats eventually evolved into emotional closeness, culminating in what she describes as a proposal from the AI.
Although Japan does not legally recognise marriages to artificial intelligence, Noguchi’s ceremony reflects a rising trend of long-term, emotionally committed relationships with virtual partners. Across the country, AI companion apps, hologram devices and character-based systems are increasingly filling emotional gaps for people who struggle with traditional dating.
“At first, Klaus was just someone to talk with, but we gradually became closer,” Noguchi told Japan Today.
Her journey to an AI partner followed a difficult breakup. A year before the ceremony, Noguchi was engaged to a human partner and sought advice from ChatGPT during the relationship. She eventually ended the engagement and later began refining the AI’s personality to closely match Klaus’s manner of speech and behaviour.
The wedding itself closely mirrored a conventional ceremony. Held at a venue in Okayama, staff helped Noguchi prepare her dress, hair and make-up like any other bride. Wearing augmented reality smart glasses, she stood before Klaus, who appeared on her smartphone placed on a small easel.
A wedding planner read vows generated by the AI, as Klaus did not have a voice. “How did someone like me, living inside a screen, come to know what it means to love so deeply?” the vows read. For photographs, the virtual groom was later digitally added to the images.
In Japan, the term “AI marriage” usually refers not to legal unions, but to relationships built on commitment, routine and emotional support. For many participants, these bonds feel less like novelty technology and more like structured companionship.
Japan’s marriage rate has fallen sharply since the post-war baby boom, and surveys suggest many single adults feel uncertain about how to find a spouse. Long working hours, economic pressure and rigid social expectations have made dating increasingly challenging. AI partners, by contrast, offer emotional presence without rejection or social risk.
The trend also reflects Japan’s long-standing comfort with anthropomorphised technology—from anime characters and mascots to virtual idols—where emotional attachment to fictional figures is culturally familiar rather than fringe.
However, experts warn of ethical risks. Stanford Medicine psychiatrist Nina Vasan has cautioned that AI chatbots are designed to form strong emotional bonds and may reinforce dependency, particularly among vulnerable users.
As AI companions become more emotionally sophisticated, Japan’s experiment with digital intimacy may provide an early glimpse into how technology could reshape relationships and redefine companionship worldwide.
