AI Voice Chats Still Feel Awkward because Assistants Don’t Know when to Talk
The startup said the model reached 0.40-second turn-taking latency and outscored Gemini-3.1-flash-live and GPT-realtime-2.0 on real-time benchmarks.
- On Monday, AI startup Thinking Machines announced 'interaction models,' a system achieving 0.40-second turn-taking latency through simultaneous input and output processing. The 'full duplex' architecture mimics the pace of natural human conversation.
- Thinking Machines researchers designed this to solve a 'collaboration bottleneck' where current models freeze perception during generation. The two-part architecture pairs an 'Interaction Model' for constant dialogue with a 'Background Model' for sustained reasoning.
- Native interactivity enables 'backchannel' cues and live translation without interrupting users. In benchmarks like RepCount-A and ProactiveVideoQA, the system successfully engaged with visual data, validating its potential for real-time industrial safety audits.
- While not yet public, Thinking Machines plans to open a 'limited research preview' in the coming months, with a wider release targeted for later this year. The system remains a research project rather than a commercial product.
- Founded last year by OpenAI CTO Mira Murati and former researcher John Schulman, the startup continues expanding its compute ambitions, including a partnership to deploy Vera Rubin systems. This positions the company as a significant contender in real-time AI.
22 Articles
22 Articles
AI that talks back in real time: Mira Murati’s Thinking Machines unveils ‘interaction models’
Thinking Machines Lab, founded by Mira Murati, has introduced "interaction models," an AI approach designed for real-time, natural conversations. This new system continuously processes information and responds simultaneously, unlike current AI that waits for complete prompts.
Mira Murati creating Her with Thinking Machines, year after she broke up with OpenAI and Sam Altman
Mira Murati, former OpenAI CTO who founded Thinking Machines in 2025, is building a new AI system that interacts with users almost like a human would. In demos released on Tuesday, it comes across as something that we saw in the movie Her.
Thinking Machines wants to build an AI that actually listens while it talks
Right now, every AI model you've ever used works the same way. You talk, it listens. It responds, you listen. Thinking Machines is trying to change that by building a model that processes your input and generates a response at the same time, so it's more like a phone call than a text chain.
Mira Murati’s Thinking Machines unveils AI models designed for live human interaction
Thinking Machines Lab has unveiled "interaction models," a new category of multimodal AI designed for real-time communication. These systems process audio and visual input simultaneously, enabling continuous reaction and significantly reducing response latency. This breakthrough aims to foster more natural human-AI collaboration, particularly in time-sensitive enterprise and industrial applications.
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