After Character.AI
- 13%Joined a startup3
- 88%Elsewhere
Shares of those who moved on, by their next stop.
People who leave Character.AI most often go to DeepMind, OpenAI and Meta. Of them, 13% go somewhere small. The median tenure is 1y 6m
Not Character.AI's headcount: these are the engineers in the Zelcast network and the profiles run through the Eng Scorer. 33 people on a map of 67,181, No. 750 on it by people. Updated September 30, 2026.
- People on the map
- 33Under 0.1% of everyone on the map
- There now
- 721% of the people here
- Moved on
- 2679% of the people here
- Median tenure
- 1y 6mmiddle half 10m to 2y 4m
Came from, went to
Ribbon width is the number of people who made the move. Most arrive from Google. Most leave for DeepMind (29% of recorded departures).
4 of 31 recorded arrivals shown, 27 more from 27 other companies14 of 24 recorded departures shown, 10 more to 8 other companies
How long people stay
31%<1y
38%1-2y
31%2-4y
0%4-7y
0%7y+
32 stays with both a start and an end on the record.
Who comes and goes, by year
4021
0022
9023
131124
51425
<3<326
joined left2026 is a partial year
2021 to 2026: 33 joined, 26 left.
Caliber
Not enough scored profiles here yet (17).
Titles held here
- Member of Technical Staff18
- Research Engineer7
2 most common titles, by people who held them.
First job on the record for 3% of people here.
Whether a title rose here
The level of the first title recorded here, against the last.
11%Titles that rose3 of 27 classified people
- 11%Rose3 people
- 67%Stayed level18 people
- 22%Fell6 people
27 of the 33 people here had a title that could be placed on the ladder before and after.
A title rose when the last title recorded here sits higher on the ladder than the first. For someone with one title here who then left, it's measured against the first title of their next role. The ladder runs intern, junior, mid, senior, staff or manager, principal, director, VP, then founder or C-level. Titles that match no rung are left out rather than guessed, and product, program and project managers are left out entirely as a different ladder. What's left leans towards people who have left: someone still here on one recorded title has nothing to measure against.
Where they studied
- Stanford21.9%
- UC Berkeley18.8%
The 2 most listed schools among the 32 people here with a school on file.
7 of the 32 people here with a school on file list Stanford and 6 list UC Berkeley. A person can list more than one, so these overlap.
Public work
one square is one in a hundred
36%have a public GitHub account on their profile
12 of the 33 people here whose profile was checked for public accounts. An account the check missed reads the same as no account, so this is a floor.
31% is the median across the 857 companies that can show this figure.
Where they are now
97% of the people who have worked at Character.AI and list a location live in the San Francisco Bay Area today, against 41% of everyone on the map.
Character.AI
Everyone on the map
- 97%SF Bay Area32 · map 41%
All 33 people who worked at Character.AI list a location, and every share here is over them.
Where they live now, from the profile as it reads today, not where they sat while working at Character.AI: a metro here isn't an office there. The lower strip is the same metros across the whole map.
On the same resumes
Companies that show up most often alongside Character.AI, at any point in a career.
Key facts
- 33 people on the Zelcast alumni map have worked at Character.AI: 7 are there now, 26 have moved on.
- Most leave for DeepMind: 7 people, 29% of recorded departures. Then OpenAI and Meta.
- Most arrive from Google: 4 people.
- Median tenure at Character.AI: 1y 6m, middle half 10m to 2y 4m.
- Of the people with a recorded next move after Character.AI, fewer than 3 went to a founder title next, 13% joined a company of 200 or fewer, and fewer than 3 joined one of 10,000 or more.
- Most common title held here: Member of Technical Staff, then Research Engineer.
- Top school: Stanford, listed by 7 of the 32 people here with one on file (21.9%). Then UC Berkeley (6).
- 97% of the 33 people here who list a location live in SF Bay Area today, against 41% across the map. Where they live now, not the office they sat in while they worked here.
- 36% of the 33 people here whose profile was checked for public accounts have a public GitHub.
- 3 rose, 18 stayed level, 6 fell, out of the 27 people here whose title could be placed on a ladder before and after.
About this data: built from 352,028 jobs across 67,181 engineers in the Zelcast network and Eng Scorer reads, updated September 30, 2026. A move counts when the next role starts within 24 months of leaving. Companies under 20 people on the map aren't shown, and destinations under 3 people fold into the totals. Caliber is the Eng Scorer score.
Worked at Character.AI? See how your profile reads to a startup hiring manager, and where it ranks among 67,181 engineers.
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