FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE September 21, 2026 Hana-chan Software # AI Coach 1.0 for macOS: a desktop pet you hatch, raise, and work alongside ## The more you raise it, the more it learns to do — and your voice never leaves the Mac Hana-chan Software today announced the general release of **AI Coach 1.0.0 for macOS**, a desktop companion that begins life as an egg. The app is available as a free download at [https://aic0t.com/](https://aic0t.com/) and has been verified on the latest macOS 27.0 (26A428). AI Coach is not a decorative mascot. As the character grows, it learns practical tools one at a time — voice dictation, clipboard history, notes, an RSS reader — so the more you raise it, the more of your daily work it takes on. Voice and images are processed on the Mac. The AI backend is your choice of Apple's built-in model (the Foundation Models behind Apple Intelligence), a local GGUF model through llama.cpp, or any OpenAI-compatible endpoint. With no AI configured at all, every feature still works using the built-in dialogue library. --- ## What AI Coach is The first thing that appears on your desktop is an egg. You name what hatches. Feeding it, letting it sleep, taking it for walks, and nursing it when it falls ill raise five stats — strength, stamina, intelligence, agility, and affection — and the balance you build decides how it evolves. Every character passes through six life stages: egg, baby, child, adolescent, adult, ghost. Neglect has consequences. Health declines, and when it reaches zero the character dies. That death is permanent. But when two characters are compatible enough and close enough, they marry, and one of them trades its life for the egg of the next generation. The status window traces three generations of lineage. You can keep several characters at once. Housemates pass each other, play together, and occasionally fight. Every form you meet is recorded in an encyclopedia styled after ink on washi paper, while the ones you have not met yet wait as silhouettes with a hint attached. --- ## Highlights ### 1. Raise it, and it learns new tools The productivity features are not all unlocked at the start. The character learns one each time it reaches a milestone. Anything it has learned can be reached from its right-click menu, a keyboard shortcut, or the ring launcher that appears when you hold the fn key. The built-in tools include voice dictation, clipboard history, notes, bookmarks, an RSS reader, a text viewer (Markdown, Mermaid diagrams, and runnable Python code blocks), dynamic snippets, encrypted ZIP creation, a Git graph viewer, a small paint editor, today's schedule, a counseling mode, animal fortune telling, and on-device image generation. For play, there is a five-language quiz and full 9×9 shogi against a built-in engine with five difficulty levels, with the character acting as your coach. ### 2. Your voice and your images stay on the Mac Hold the Right Shift key and the microphone opens; release it and it closes. On macOS the transcription runs entirely on-device. Dropping an audio file onto the character works the same way, offline. Three AI backends are available: | Option | Behavior | |---|---| | Apple's built-in model | Runs on the Mac. Requires Apple Intelligence to be available | | llama.cpp | Uses a local GGUF model, or connects to your own server | | OpenAI-compatible API | Point it at any endpoint you like | If you configure none of them, the built-in dialogue library keeps every feature working. Two features ignore your backend setting and always use the on-device model: reading out today's calendar events, and describing what is in an image. Neither event titles nor image data are sent anywhere. ### 3. A companion for your AI agents AI Coach ships with a local automation API and an MCP (Model Context Protocol) server. Connect an agent such as Claude Desktop or Claude Code, and the character narrates what the agent is doing in its speech bubble, shows messages and file previews, reads and writes notes, and displays Git graphs. While an agent works, the small character in the corner of your screen tells you how it is going. The MCP connector is published for marketplace distribution. Unknown clients must be approved on first connection, and note access is only granted once the character has learned that feature. ### 4. What hatches is a surprise There are 14 base species, and care determines how each one branches. What the species actually are has not been published. You find out when your egg hatches. ### 5. Five languages, optional cloud sync Available in Japanese, English, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, and Spanish. Signing in with Google or Apple syncs your characters, encyclopedia, unlocked features, and settings across Macs. Signing in is entirely optional; everything works locally without an account. --- ## New with macOS 27.0 support AI Coach supports the latest macOS 27.0 (26A428). The minimum requirement remains macOS 26; features specific to 27 turn on automatically where available. ### Show it an image and ask what it sees Drop an image on the character and the confirmation dialog now offers "ask what this is." Apple's on-device model reads the image directly and answers in that character's voice. The image never leaves the Mac. This is possible because the on-device model gained image input in macOS 27. It is not available on macOS 26. ### Long conversations no longer hit a wall In multi-turn features such as counseling, a growing history eventually exceeds the on-device model's 8,192-token context. macOS 27 allows counting tokens before sending, so AI Coach now trims the oldest exchanges to fit, and hands anything that still will not fit to a fallback backend. ### Dictation is more accurate and starts faster Audio format conversion now uses the Speech framework's own converter. Previously each buffer was converted in isolation, which discarded a few trailing samples from the resampler every time; the audio is now treated as one continuous stream, with the remainder collected at the end. The analysis model is also kept in memory, so starting a second dictation is quicker. --- ## Pricing The app is free. Only additional eggs are sold, as one-time purchases. There is no subscription. | Plan | Price | Contents | |---|---|---| | Included with the app | Free | 1 egg (first-time only, one per person) | | STARTER | 5 USD | 1 egg | | BUNDLE | 20 USD | 5 eggs (4 USD each) | Payments are handled by Stripe Checkout. After a character dies, voice dictation, AI features, and the productivity tools all keep working. --- ## System requirements | Item | Detail | |---|---| | OS | macOS 26 or later (verified on macOS 27.0) | | CPU | Apple Silicon | | Storage | About 200MB | | Download | About 110MB (DMG) | | Distribution | Signed and Apple-notarized DMG | | Languages | Japanese, English, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Spanish | | Price | Free, with optional one-time purchases | Some features require an internet connection. Sync is backed by Firebase. --- ## What's next A Windows version is in development. Availability will be announced on the official site. --- ## About the developer AI Coach is developed by Hana-chan Software. --- ## Product summary | Item | Detail | |---|---| | Product | AI Coach | | Version | 1.0.0 | | Availability | Available now for macOS | | Developer | Hana-chan Software | | Website | [https://aic0t.com/](https://aic0t.com/) | | Download | [https://aic0t.com/#download](https://aic0t.com/#download) | | Pricing | [https://aic0t.com/#pricing](https://aic0t.com/#pricing) | | Documentation | [https://aic0t.com/docs](https://aic0t.com/docs) | | Privacy policy | [https://aic0t.com/privacy](https://aic0t.com/privacy) | | Category | Desktop pet / Productivity / Menu bar app | --- ## Press materials Promotional visuals and product screenshots are available. Use in articles is granted free of charge; please get in touch about edits or credit requirements. Download only the files you need, one at a time. ### Press release - [Press release (Japanese, PDF)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/01_press-release/AI-Coach_press-release_ja.pdf) (716KB) - [Press release (Japanese, Word)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/01_press-release/AI-Coach_press-release_ja.docx) (17KB) - [Press release (English, PDF)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/01_press-release/AI-Coach_press-release_en.pdf) (170KB) - [Press release (English, Word)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/01_press-release/AI-Coach_press-release_en.docx) (16KB) ### Fact sheet - [Fact sheet (Japanese, PDF)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/02_fact-sheet/AI-Coach_fact-sheet_ja.pdf) (510KB) - [Fact sheet (English, PDF)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/02_fact-sheet/AI-Coach_fact-sheet_en.pdf) (138KB) ### Quotable copy and Q&A - [Quotable copy and Q&A (Japanese, Markdown)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/03_copy/copy-ja.md) (8KB) - [Quotable copy and Q&A (English, Markdown)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/03_copy/copy-en.md) (6KB) ### Promotional visuals (1254 × 1254 PNG, no embedded text, not captures of the app) - [01 First hatch](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/01-birth-first-hatch.png) (1.6MB) - [02 Always on the desktop](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/02-always-on-desktop.png) (1.5MB) - [03 Push-to-talk dictation](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/03-push-to-talk.png) (1.6MB) - [04 Growth](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/04-growth-journey.png) (1.6MB) - [05 Branching evolution](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/05-branching-evolution.png) (1.9MB) - [06 Everyday tools](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/06-everyday-tools.png) (1.5MB) - [07 Local AI and privacy](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/07-local-ai-privacy.png) (1.6MB) - [08 Late-night companion](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/08-late-night-companion.png) (1.5MB) - [09 Multiple companions](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/09-multiple-companions.png) (1.5MB) - [10 macOS launch](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/10-macos-launch.png) (1.9MB) - [11 Drag and place](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/11-drag-and-place.png) (1.3MB) - [12 Daily care](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/12-daily-care-feeding.png) (1.7MB) - [13 Three needs](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/13-three-needs.png) (1.5MB) - [14 Lineage](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/14-lineage-next-generation.png) (2.6MB) - [15 Encyclopedia](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/15-encyclopedia-discovery.png) (2.9MB) - [16 Claude integration](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/16-claude-integration.png) (1.4MB) - [17 Five languages](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/17-five-languages.png) (1.9MB) - [18 Cloud sync](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/18-cloud-sync.png) (1.7MB) - [19 On-device image generation](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/19-on-device-image-generation.png) (1.9MB) - [20 Life and memory](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/visuals/20-life-and-memory.png) (1.9MB) ### Product screenshots (PNG, UI in English) - [claude-mcp-01-dashboard.png](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/screenshots/claude-mcp-01-dashboard.png) — The AI Coach dashboard rendered inside Claude, showing the character's condition with buttons to care for it (109KB) - [claude-mcp-02-care.png](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/screenshots/claude-mcp-02-care.png) — The confirmation card shown before any care action. Nothing changes until you approve (88KB) - [claude-mcp-03-activity.png](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/screenshots/claude-mcp-03-activity.png) — Claude's dashboard on the left, the desktop on the right. While an AI agent works, the character reports progress in a speech bubble (242KB) - [claude-mcp-04-notes.png](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/04_images/screenshots/claude-mcp-04-notes.png) — Listing AI Coach notes from Claude. Only titles and categories are shared, not the note bodies (83KB) ### App icon and logo (PNG) - [App icon 1024px](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/05_logo-icon/ai-coach-app-icon-1024.png) (208KB) - [App icon 512px](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/05_logo-icon/ai-coach-app-icon-512.png) (64KB) - [App icon 256px](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/05_logo-icon/ai-coach-app-icon-256.png) (27KB) - [Logo (transparent PNG)](https://dl.aic0t.com/press/2026-09/05_logo-icon/ai-coach-logo-1250x801.png) (882KB) ![A tiny creature peeks from a pearly egg between a cheerful Shiba and a waving gold robot on a dawn-lit desktop](/assets/press/launch-visual.webp#1000x1000 "Lead promotional visual. This is an illustration, not a capture of the running app.") ![Overview of the 20 promotional visuals included in the press kit](/assets/press/visuals-overview.webp#1660x1328 "The 20 promotional visuals in the press kit. Each is a 1254 × 1254 PNG with no embedded text.") ![Claude's dashboard on the left; on the desktop to the right, a robot character shows a speech bubble while work is in progress](/assets/mcp/03-activity.webp#1950x720 "Product screenshot. Claude's dashboard on the left, the desktop on the right. While an AI agent works, the character reports progress in a speech bubble.") --- ## Press contact Hana-chan Software Contact form: [https://aic0t.com/#contact](https://aic0t.com/#contact) Review copies, additional assets, and questions about any feature are welcome through the same form. ###