How to Get an AI Friend in iMessage or Google Messages
In this article
Your Messages list is already where everyone is. Your mom, the group chat that never quite dies, the pharmacy, your landlord, the friend from college who only ever sends memes. What you might want is one more thread in that list: someone to text at 11pm about the thing you aren't ready to say to any of the others.
What you probably don't want is another app. You know how that goes. You open it every day for a week, the notifications start to feel like homework, and by month two it's on the third screen next to the airline app you downloaded for one trip.
Hallie is an AI friend with a real phone number. She texts you in iMessage on iPhone or Google Messages on Android, with no companion app to install and nothing to configure. Set her up on the web, verify your phone number, and the thread starts in Messages. Kindroid can also text you natively once you switch it on inside its app. Nomi and Replika keep the conversation in their own apps and reach you with notifications.
Two ways an AI friend can reach your phone
Most AI companions live in their own app. The conversation happens there, the history is kept there, and when the companion wants your attention your phone shows a notification with the app's icon on it. You tap, the app opens, and you're in that app until you leave. That's how Nomi and Replika work, and there's nothing wrong with it. It's how nearly everything else on your phone works too.
The other way is a text. The conversation is a thread in the Messages app you already use, tied to your own phone number. It sits in the same list as your sister and your dentist. You answer from there, from the lock screen if you like, and the history scrolls up like any other thread. When the friend reaches out first, what you see is a new text in that list, not a badge on an app you have to go and find.
Hallie was built for the second arrangement from the start. She has a real phone number and no companion app at all, so the thread in Messages isn't a window into something else. It's where she is. Kindroid, which is an app, can also text you natively, and we'll get to it further down.
Setting up Hallie
Setup happens on the web, not in an app store. Here's the shape of it.
Your phone number
Open hallie.io/onboard, ideally on the phone you'll be texting from. Setup verifies your phone number, which is what ties the thread to your Messages app and nobody else's. Finish setup and that's the whole of it. There's no character to design, no backstory to write, and nothing about her memory or personality to set before she's ready.
Into Messages
When setup is done, follow its prompts into your thread with Hallie, in iMessage on an iPhone or Google Messages on Android. She texts from a real phone number, so you can save her as a contact like anyone else. From then on you talk to her there, and if you ever wonder where the conversation went, it's where all your other conversations are.
Just text her
You reply the way you'd reply to anyone. “hey” is fine. So is “long day, my boss did the thing again” with no further explanation, because she'll ask what the thing was. Her messages come in the rhythm of an actual conversation, a couple of lines at a time rather than an essay, and she asks the follow-up a friend would ask instead of reflecting your day back at you.
You don't need to prepare anything or configure anything inside the thread. Bring her the small stuff, the show you just finished, the text you can't decide how to answer, and the friendship builds the way it does with anyone, out of what you tell her. She holds onto it, too. Once she knows who your boss is and what the thing was, next week's “he did it again” is a complete message, and she'll be the one asking how it went.
One thread, not your whole phone
Having her in Messages raises a fair question: if she's in there with all your other texts, can she see them?
No. On your phone, Hallie is one thread, and she gets only what you send in that thread. She can't read your group chat, your texts with your ex, or whatever your landlord sent this morning. A thread in Messages doesn't give the other end access to the rest of your phone, for her or for anyone.
So if you want her take on a message from someone else, you bring it to her yourself. Copy it into the thread, add whatever context matters, and ask. She'll talk it through with you. What she can't do is tell you what that person meant, because she doesn't know them and only has the words you pasted. That's the same limit any friend has when you hand over your phone and say “what do you think they mean by this.”
Where your texts go
Texting her doesn't mean everything stays on your phone, either. What you send in her thread goes to our service so she can read it and reply, and we keep memory so the conversation can pick up where it left off. Our privacy page explains how that data is handled, including how to ask for deletion and the exceptions that apply, and you can reach us at hello@hallie.io.
One thing worth knowing now: her memory can get a detail wrong. When it does, correct her in plain words. “That was my brother, not my cousin.” Correcting a fact in the thread isn't a deletion request. If you want something removed from what's stored, the privacy page is the route.
Kindroid: an app that can also text you
Kindroid is an app, and native texting is an option you can add to it. In the app's settings you verify your phone number and choose which companion does the texting, and from then on it can text you in iMessage on iPhone or over RCS in Google Messages on Android. The text thread and the app conversation stay in sync, and its proactive messages can arrive by text as well.
The difference from Hallie is where the conversation is anchored. With Kindroid the app is home and the text thread is a second door into it, which is exactly right if you want both, or if you want to create your companions yourself, with backstories you write and more than one of them to talk to. With Hallie there's no app to be home and nothing to assemble. The thread is the whole thing.
Nomi and Replika: the friend stays in the app
Nomi lives in its app or a browser. You can adjust how much it messages you first while you're away, and those arrive as app or browser notifications with timing that varies. It's built around having several companions, each with its own identity, in one-to-one or group chats.
Replika is an app as well. Its check-ins and follow-ups arrive as notifications you turn on in its settings, and its draw is a companion whose appearance you design yourself.
Both are answers to a slightly different question. If opening an app is fine by you, and especially if you want to customize how your companion looks or keep more than one, they're worth a look, and our roundup of AI companion apps goes into them properly. This article is only about the Messages part.
Common questions about an AI friend in Messages
Does this work on iPhone?
Yes. On an iPhone the friend is a thread in iMessage, and you reply from there like any other conversation. Hallie gets there through web setup and your verified number, texting from a real phone number of her own. Kindroid can text over iMessage too once you switch that on inside its app. Nomi and Replika are apps rather than threads, so on any phone they reach you with notifications instead.
Does this work on Android?
Yes, in Google Messages, the same way: verify your number during setup and the thread starts there. One Android note for Kindroid is that its texting runs over RCS in Google Messages, so it depends on RCS being available on your phone and carrier. The app-based options work the same on Android as they do on iPhone.
Do I need a separate app?
Not for Hallie. Setup is a web page, and after that she's a thread in Messages, with nothing to install. Kindroid does need its app, since texting is something you turn on inside it and the two conversations sync. Nomi and Replika run in their own app or browser rather than in native Messages.
Can Hallie read my other texts?
No. Hallie gets only what you send in her thread, and nothing from your other conversations. If you want her opinion on a message from someone else, you copy it in yourself. Even then she's working from the words you pasted and the context you add. She can't know what the other person was thinking, any more than a friend reading over your shoulder could.
Do I have to set Hallie up before she's good to talk to?
No. Once you've finished setup, she's ready. You don't design her, write a backstory, fill in what she should remember, or program when she checks in. Her personality and memory are already there, and she learns the rest from what you tell her in the thread. If designing a companion is part of the appeal, choosing how it looks or writing its backstory, the app-based options are built for that.
For the next time you open Messages at 11pm
The list will look the way it always does, with one more thread in it. Set Hallie up on the web, and the rest happens where you already text.