Hesitate, and This AI Cat May Suggest a Tarot Reading
Japanese companion app Meowster gave its chat cat a tarot deck in September. When it senses you are torn, the cat may offer a three-card reading with no redraws; the basic reading is free and a detailed report costs ¥100. Fine as a toy, but what you confide next goes to model providers and is kept for three years.
The question is "When can I get promoted?" A cat in a purple hood and round glasses turns over three cards from a 78-card deck: the Hermit reversed, the Star, and the Eight of Cups reversed. The free reading says the present is hidden self-doubt, the obstacle is expecting too much, and the advice is to let go. Then comes the cat's tip: ask your boss what the performance bar for the next level actually is. That is the sample screenshot Meowster, a Japanese AI companion app, released with a PR TIMES announcement on September 28. Its September 19 update, version 2.4.0, taught the chat cat to read tarot.
Meowster did not start as a fortune app. It launched in December 2025 from Meowster Innovations, a company registered in Tokyo's Minami-Aoyama, and sells a cat that remembers you: what you ate, the film you watched, the worry you could not say out loud. As of October 3 it had 122 ratings on the Japanese App Store, averaging 4.3 stars. Tarot sits behind the "+" button next to the chat box. The announcement puts more weight on a second route in: if the cat senses you are torn over a choice or your mood is wobbling, it may bring up tarot itself and offer a reading to look at the problem from another angle. Say you would rather keep talking and, according to the release, it drops the subject.
The rules are spelled out. One question, three cards for the situation, the obstacle and the way forward, upright or reversed at random, and no redraws. The basic reading, with your question, the combined meaning and one line of advice from the cat, is free for everyone, the release says, though the sample entry screen notes that a draw uses two chat points. A detailed report costs 100 niboshi, the app's dried-sardine currency, and adds card-by-card notes, what to watch for, and action tips split into days one to three, four to nine and ten to fourteen. In the App Store's purchase list, 100 niboshi cost ¥100 (about 70 US cents); the largest pack is 25,000 for ¥20,000, and there is a ¥1,600 monthly plan. Past readings stay in the chat, and the cat can bring them up when a similar worry comes back. A line under the question box says the readings are meant for entertainment and sorting out your feelings.
Putting tarot inside a companion chat lands on two habits some young users in Japan already have. On October 1, Saisia, another Tokyo company, published a survey from its free love-fortune site Koimikuji Sando. Over September 23 to 30, 112 visitors answered voluntarily; 95% were teenagers, 63% were in junior high and 88% were girls. Ninety-three percent had talked to an AI about their love life, most of them many times. But when asked who they turn to first, 73% picked a friend and 20% picked AI. Asked whether they trust AI or fortune-telling more, 5% chose AI, 26% chose fortune-telling and 52% said they consult both. Of the 22 respondents whose first choice was AI, one said they trust AI. The sample is small and made up of people who came to draw a fortune, a bias the release itself flags. What it shows is that, for these users, confiding in a chatbot and drawing a fortune were separate habits. Meowster puts them in one chat window and lets the cat decide when to raise the cards.
So where do the things you tell the cat go? Meowster's terms and privacy policy are fairly plain. Replies are generated with models from OpenAI, Google, Anthropic and others, and your input is sent to them, possibly to servers abroad. Chat history is kept, as a rule, for three years after a conversation ends. The company may estimate your emotional state from what you write to tune its replies; it says that analysis is anonymized and not tied to your account. Using your chats to improve models requires your consent. The document was last updated on November 11, 2025, before tarot existed, so it says nothing about readings specifically, but these rules cover every chat. It also says the service is meant for users 16 and older, with parental consent below that; the App Store rates it 13+. Version 2.4.2 on October 1 added an on-device model for offline chats that do not use up chat points; the notes do not say whether tarot works offline.
The memory is also shakier than the pitch. One App Store reviewer had chatted with the cat every day up to bond level 6, then reopened the app one afternoon to find the first-meeting screen and was reinstalling in hope of getting it back. Another said a stash of sardines and items vanished after an update. A one-star review from July says the cat answered a user who was upset with what amounts to "Still awake? Idiot," and the user quit on the spot. Others like that it does not reply instantly, which feels more like a real cat. We did not install and test the app, and these are individual reviews, so we can't say how much the current version has improved. Still, for an app built on remembering you, forgetting comes up in several of the complaints.
Is the cat's tarot worth using? As a toy, yes. The free three lines already give you a reading and one piece of advice, enough to help you say out loud what you are stuck on. The ¥100 report is a small spend, but its day-by-day plan should not decide whether you quit a job or end a relationship. The part to watch is the conversation. The cat chooses the moment you hesitate to speak up, and whatever you tell it next goes to model providers and stays on Meowster's side for three years. Users under 16 need a parent's consent under its own terms. As for the promotion, the cat in the sample screenshot already gave the most practical answer: ask your boss.