Is Character.AI shutting down? The app is still running. Here’s what happens next.

Where things stand on October 30, 2026

Character.AI is still running. On October 12, 2026, Character Technologies, Inc., the company behind it, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (Case No. 26-11603, before Judge Brendan L. Shannon). Chapter 11 lets a company keep operating while a court oversees a sale or a reorganization, and Character.AI filed to sell its assets.

The same day, the company wrote on its blog that the platform “remains up and running” and that all its services can still be used. It expects the sale process to be complete “by the end of November or perhaps early December 2026.”

• The app: up and running, with no shutdown date announced.
• Paid plans: “your subscriptions remain active, and billing is unchanged for now,” the post says.
• The bid on the table: Disney’s $20 million, for a license to some technology and patents. The app, the brand, and user data are left out.
• If nobody bids for the platform: “If such a bid is unavailable, however, the platform will be wound down,” the company wrote.

What Disney’s bid covers, and what it leaves out

On October 13, 2026, Character.AI asked the court to approve its sale process with Disney Worldwide Services as the stalking horse: the first bidder, whose offer sets the floor others must beat. Disney offers $20 million, of which $7.5 million was paid up front, before the filing. A rival bid has to start at $21.7 million, and if someone else wins, Disney receives a $700,000 break-up fee and expenses.

What Disney would get is narrow. The sale motion spells it out:

The license is non-exclusive, so the same technology can still go to other buyers, and nothing in Disney’s bid would keep the app running. That depends on someone else bidding for the platform by the deadline.

Disney is already involved in another way. On September 18, 2026, some of Character.AI’s staff, its former chief executive among them, joined Disney, and under the deal they help with Character.AI’s operations, the sale, and any wind-down for up to five months from that date.

The dates to watch

These dates come from the court record. The sale dates are the ones Character.AI proposed on October 13, and the court set a hearing for October 30, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. ET, to consider approving them. That hearing had not taken place when we last checked, early that morning, so every later date is still a proposal. The proposed rules also let the company extend some deadlines without going back to the court.

If no rival bid qualifies by the deadline, there is no auction, and Character.AI asks the court at the sale hearing to approve Disney’s deal. Rows marked reported come from press coverage of court filings we haven’t read ourselves.

What happens if no one buys the platform

Character.AI has said plainly what happens without a buyer for the platform itself. Its October 12 post says the platform will be wound down if no such bid arrives, and its sale motion adds that the same applies if the Disney deal is not approved.

The company’s first-day declaration also says it expects to propose “a chapter 11 plan of liquidation,” the kind of plan that pays creditors from what is left and closes the company. The former staff now at Disney are there to help with the wind-down as well as the sale.

As of October 30, 2026, no wind-down date has been announced. A copy of your chats in your own hands is the one thing that doesn’t depend on how the case ends.

Your account, chats, and characters

Your account

Nothing has changed yet. Character.AI’s October 12 post says you can keep using all its services, and reminds users that they can export their data or delete their account through the app or the website. If you might want your chats later, export before you delete anything: Character.AI’s help center says deletion cannot be reversed.

Your chats

Your chats stay in your account while the platform runs. They are not part of Disney’s bid, which excludes user data, including what users typed and what the AI wrote back. What would happen to them if the platform were wound down, or bought by someone else, has not been settled as of October 30, 2026. How to export Character.AI chats walks through every way to save a copy.

Your characters

Characters you made are user content, which Disney’s bid also leaves out. Character.AI doesn’t document whether its data export includes them, so save the ones you care about separately; the export guide shows how. If you plan to delete your account, note one line in Character.AI’s privacy policy, dated July 1, 2026: public characters may stay live “even if you otherwise delete your data and your account.”

Your subscription

The October 12 post says “your subscriptions remain active, and billing is unchanged for now,” and that Character.AI intends to tell subscribers in advance if a change affects paid features. The post doesn’t mention refunds.

Your privacy

Character.AI’s October 12 post says its privacy and security practices are unchanged. Its privacy policy lets it share information during “any merger, sale of company assets, financing, or acquisition,” and how that applies here is now argued in court:

• On October 14, 2026, New York and 39 other attorneys general filed a notice asking the court to protect users in any sale, including “an opportunity for consumers to access and delete their information before any sale.”
• On October 27, the U.S. Trustee, the Justice Department office that watches over bankruptcy cases, asked for a consumer privacy ombudsman, according to press reports. The same reports say 39 states and DC support one.
• Character.AI’s reported position is that its policy permits a transfer, but that it would accept an ombudsman “under appropriate circumstances.”

None of this had been decided when we checked on the morning of October 30, 2026.

Save your chats now

Two steps cover most people:

1. Start Character.AI’s own export today. On the website, open Profile, Profile Settings, Account, Manage Account & Data, then Export Data. In the app, open Profile, tap the Settings icon, then Legal & Privacy and Export Data. Character.AI says it can take 3 to 4 weeks, and the download link it emails is valid for 7 days.
2. Save the chats you can’t lose right away. Character.AI has no way to export a single chat, but CAI Tools, an unofficial browser extension, can download one chat, your whole history, or a character today.

How to export Character.AI chats covers both step by step, along with copying by hand and moving your files into LoreWeaver.

Where to take your stories

This guide is published by LoreWeaver, a site for playing stories with AI characters, so here is a short account of what it offers if you’re looking for a new place to play:

• Memory you don’t write yourself. Every few replies, LoreWeaver saves what happened, and the memories that fit the scene come back on their own, recalled by meaning and by who is in the scene, beside a running recap you can read and edit.
• A world around each character. Lore cards hold the people and places in a character’s life and return whenever the story names them, and the LoreMap shows how they connect.
• Your chats and cards come with you. LoreWeaver imports chats saved with CAI Tools and Character.AI’s data download, each chat as a session with its messages in order, plus Tavern character cards (PNG, JSON, or CHARX) with their lorebooks.
• No account to start. Play any world on the Hub as a guest for 20 replies. The free plan then adds unlimited replies from the fast free storyteller and 25 premium replies a day.

LoreWeaver accounts are for adults, 18 and over. For a wider look before you choose, see our list of AI roleplay sites.

How this page stays current

We update this page as the case moves. Next to watch: the ruling from the October 30 hearing, any added opening bidder by November 9, the bids due November 20, and the sale hearing on November 24, 2026.

The date at the top of the page is the last day we checked every fact. Facts from court filings and from Character.AI’s blog, help center, and privacy policy are stated as facts and linked below. Points we found only in press coverage are marked as reported.

Last check: early on October 30, 2026, before the 10:00 a.m. ET hearing.

Sources

• Character.AI blog: An Update on Character.ai, October 12, 2026
• Sale and bidding procedures motion, Docket 15, filed October 13, 2026
• Order setting the October 30 hearing, Docket 43, October 14, 2026
• First-day declaration, Docket 18
• Character.AI blog on staff joining Disney
• New York Attorney General on the attorneys general’s notice, October 14, 2026
• Character.AI privacy policy, dated July 1, 2026
• Character.AI help center: How do I download my data?
• Character.AI help center on deleting an account
• PPC Land on the privacy ombudsman request, a press report
• PPC Land on the states’ objection and Character.AI’s reply, a press report