Sorry Tamagotchi Fans, It’s AI Time

When they said, “Nothing in this world is sacred,†they meant Tamagotchis, too, or at least Tamagotchi rip-offs. While you might remember your virtual pets of yore with all the analog goodness that the ’90s had to offer, this is the year of our lord 2026, and everything has to have AI. Yup, everything.

While the Sweekar, which I saw at CES 2026, isn’t actually a Tamagotchi, it pretty much is in everything but name, and, as you may have already guessed from the words above, it’s centered on AI.

What exactly is that AI doing? Ya know, just normal stuff that allows it to “feel your touch†and remember “your voice, your stories, and your quirks.†It’s time to go deeper with your virtual pets, people. Clicking a few buttons until they inevitably die from neglect isn’t enough. On a hardware level, there’s some cute stuff happening. The egg one kind of vibrates and shakes and grows, which is a fun tactile experience.

As far as capabilities go, the Sweekar allegedly “needs your love, just like a real pet,†which also means it has moods like happy, angry, sleepy, and something that Takway.Ai, which makes this little toy, is calling “sneaky smile,†which is basically just mischievous? I think? I shudder to think what else it could mean.

Just like a Tamagotchi, the Sweekar has growth cycles that include an “egg stage,†a “baby stage,†a “teen stage,†and an “adult stage.†At each stage, the pet is supposed to gain certain abilities and continually grow and understand more about you and your personality.

More than anything, though, the Sweekar is centered around using AI for memory, so it can remember your name and your favorite color and that time you forgot its birthday. This Tamagotchi’s therapy bill is going to be sizable. The people at Takway.Ai tell me that it’s using a combination of Google’s Gemini and ChatGPT to do that, and that everything you tell the Sweekar is private, though I obviously cannot verify the data practices of a company selling an AI Tamagotchi at CES.

There’s also the whole issue with AI toys having a mind of their own, which means you may want to think twice before you give this little guy to a kid.

If an AI Tamagotchi is really high on your list of things that you absolutely must have then you can eventually throw money at Sweekar’s Kickstarter in March. While there’s no official price right now, the makers of this little virtual pet say it’ll likely debut for between $150 and $200.

Gizmodo is on the ground in Las Vegas all week bringing you everything you need to know about the tech unveiled at CES 2026. You can follow our CES live blog here and find all our coverage here.