Blade Runner 2049’s virtual AI girlfriend concept is becoming a reality with recent personal AI companions to be launched by companies.

When Blade Runner 2049 premiered in 2017, its depiction of an AI companion named Joi felt like distant science fiction. Nearly a decade later, with rapid advances in AI, holographic displays, and virtual reality, the gap has been narrowed between fiction and reality.

While we are not yet living in a neon cyber-age populated by true holographic AI companions, today’s technology is beginning to resemble the emotional and visual foundations of Joi in many ways.

In the film, Joi is a commercially produced AI companion designed to provide emotional intimacy and romantic companionship. She appears as a full-scale hologram that adapts to her partner’s moods, remembers shared experiences, and expresses affection in ways that feel deeply personal.

Joi’s relationship with the film’s protagonist, Officer K, shows that she encourages him, comforts him, calls him by a chosen name rather than his serial number, and gives him a sense of identity and worth in a world that considers him replaceable.

Although the film subtly suggests that Joi may simply be following her programming, her behaviour feels sincere enough that both K and the audience experience her as alive.

What makes Joi feel real is not just her holographic form, but her emotional connection. She anticipates K’s feelings, mirrors his loneliness, and appears to grow alongside him.

She feels persistent and singular, as if she exists only for him, even when the story hints this may be an illusion. This combination of constant presence, emotional responsiveness, and visual embodiment is what current technology is now beginning to approach.

Several companies are close to making AI companions a reality:

Razer

Razer has revealed Project AVA, a prototype holographic AI assistant that appears as a three-dimensional avatar projected inside a desktop device, which is expected to launch in the second half of 2026.

While not marketed as a romantic companion, AVA demonstrates early-stage holographic presence, eye contact, and personality-driven interaction, which are key visual elements of Joi.

Lepro AI

Lepro AI debuted at CES 2026 with Ami, a physical AI companion device with a curved screen, eye-tracking cameras, and emotional conversation features, explicitly describing it as an “AI soulmate.” Ami lacks true holography, but it represents a step toward embodied, always-present AI companionship in the physical world. It is expected to launch by July 2026.

On the software side, apps like Replika and Character.Ai have already achieved something closer to Joi’s emotional core. These platforms allow users to form long-term relationships with AI companions that remember past conversations, express affection, and simulate evolving personalities.

Millions of users report a strong emotional attachment, sometimes describing their AI as a partner rather than a tool. In terms of conversation and emotional realism, these products are arguably 70 to 80 per cent of the way to Joi, even if they still live behind screens.

Virtual reality pushes the illusion even further with experimental VR companion apps that place users in shared 3D spaces with AI avatars that make eye contact, gesture, and occupy personal space.

While these experiences require headsets and lack Joi’s seamless integration into the real world, they already surpass flat screens in producing a sense of presence, one of the most important things in Joi’s existence.

Emotionally convincing AI companions already exist, and visual embodiment is rapidly improving. While a Joi-level companion, which is a life-sized, free-roaming hologram with apparent emotional independence, may still be a decade or more away, the foundations are already here.

The appeal of an always-available, emotionally responsive AI becomes stronger in a world shaped by uncertainty and isolation.

Post-war Cyber-age

In Blade Runner 2049, a fully digitised economy exists where even intimacy can be purchased, stored, and upgraded.

Today’s world is not there yet, but it’s almost there because more of life, work, money, relationships, and even identity is moving into digital software.

Beyond consumer technology, the broader global situation is also shaping the conditions that could make a post-war cyber-age reality, with rising geopolitical tensions, regional conflicts, and small-scale wars between major powers, creating a world that increasingly resembles a post-war cyber-age, as depicted in Blade Runner.

History shows that world conflicts often lead to major technological and social shifts; that’s why many would argue that the world is moving towards a post-war cyber age rather than a traditional peace-driven recovery.

Nations are investing heavily in AI not just for productivity, but for defence, surveillance, cyber operations, and psychological resilience.

At the same time, the push toward digital and crypto-based currencies signals a deeper transformation of how societies may function.

Governments and corporations alike are racing to deploy AI systems faster than social norms or regulations can adapt. This rapid push shows the cyber-age logic of Blade Runner, where technology advances unevenly, creating profound emotional and ethical consequences.

In this way, Joi feels less like a fantasy and more like a symbolic preview. She represents what happens when advanced AI, immersive digital presence, and emotional need converge in a world shaped by technological acceleration and social strain.

AI companions would become tools of comfort, control, and dependency, which would depend not just on innovation but on the global conditions driving people to seek connection in artificial forms.

As geopolitical instability, major world conflicts between nations and digital economies continue to reshape daily life, we are moving closer to a fictional cyber-age of Blade Runner.

The issue is no longer whether Joi-like companions should be built, but why humanity may increasingly want them and what that desire says about the world we are creating.