Nuance Emma: An AI Face That Reacts While You Talk

Nuance Labs launched Emma, an AI persona on live video that reacts while you are still talking. Its own test: reply timing overlapped a person's 89% of the time, against 35% for the next system.

Nuance Labs has launched Emma, an AI you talk to face to face on live video. In its announcement on November 9, 2026, the Seattle startup calls her “an AI persona you’ll actually want to meet face-to-face” and says she is built on Nuplex 1.0, a full-duplex audiovisual foundation model. Full-duplex means the model listens and speaks at the same time, the way people do.

The launch post by co-founder and CEO Fangchang Ma passed 1.3 million views on X in about eight hours. His pitch: “Most AI personas stare blankly while you talk. Emma reacts while you’re still speaking.”

The number Nuance leads with: 89% against 35%

What Nuance will not let Emma do

Nuance Labs launched Emma on November 9, 2026: an AI persona built on Nuplex 1.0, a full-duplex audiovisual model that listens and speaks at once.

On 1,785 questions from real conversations, Nuance says Nuplex’s reply timing overlapped the person’s 89% of the time. The next closest system was at 35%.

Emma’s face and voice are licensed from a real actress. The beta API cannot clone a person, and you cannot upload a face or a voice.

Emma never claims to be human, and API video carries a visible watermark. AI girlfriends or boyfriends, healthcare and under-18 uses are not allowed.

It is English only and can misjudge when to speak. It is open in most of the US, the EU, the UK and Canada, with four US states and Quebec excluded.

Most voice AI takes turns. You speak, it waits until you stop, then it answers. Nuance says Emma does not wait: “Emma talks to you with her face, not just her voice.” Per the company, she reacts with small movements while you are still speaking, such as a long blink, a squint or a turn of the head, and she uses gaze as a signal for whose turn it is.

Her personality is designed too. Nuance describes her as curious and quick-witted, with opinions she will defend, and upfront that she is an AI.

§ 02 The number Nuance leads with: 89% against 35% #

Nuance argues that reply speed alone settles little. Fast open models answer quickly. Products such as GPT-Live and Gemini Live take longer, “most likely because they would rather not cut you off.” Its view: “Faster or slower is a product decision, not a score.”

So it measured something else, which is whether the model replies when a person would. The result, in Nuance’s words: “On 1,785 questions from our own recordings of real conversations, Nuplex’s reply timing overlaps the original speaker’s 89% of the time. The next closest system is at 35%.”

Three things to keep in mind about that number:

It is Nuance’s own test, on its own recordings. No outside party has reproduced it in what we read.

The text does not name the system at 35%. The post discusses PersonaPlex, Moshi, GPT-Live and Gemini Live. It notes that the last two were reached through their public APIs, so their timing includes network time.

Nuance itself is cautious. It writes that “we believe benchmarks in the AV full-duplex space are not accurate to the user experience yet” and tells readers to try Emma and judge.

§ 03 What Nuance will not let Emma do #

Nuance says the first people who talked to Emma told it two things at once: “it was amazing, and it was a little unsettling.” Its answer is a list of limits on both Emma and the API. The first rule is the plainest: “You’ll always know you’re talking to an AI.”

Nuance adds that these checks will miss things and will sometimes end calls that were fine.

§ 04 What Emma cannot do yet #

The announcement lists its own gaps:

Timing still slips. “She can jump in while you’re still mid-thought, wait a beat too long, or miss a cue a person would catch.” Long pauses in the middle of a sentence are the hardest case.

She can be wrong. Her reasoning comes from a language model, so she can make confident mistakes.

Noise hurts. Background voices, a TV, a speakerphone or a weak microphone make turn-taking worse.

Seeing is early. With your camera on she can talk about what she sees, and she can miss details or misread a scene.

Visual glitches. Lip sync, gaze and head motion sometimes look off, and her expression can slip back to neutral.

Nuance Labs is based in Seattle. Its three co-founders hold PhDs and previously worked at Apple: Fangchang Ma (CEO), Edward Zhang (CTO) and Karren Yang (chief scientist). The company’s press page lists a $50 million Series A announced on September 14, 2026, with Lightspeed, Accel and Nvidia named in one headline, and a $10 million round in September 2025.

Related on this blog: Tavus Griffin and Gemini 3.8 Live .

An outside test of the 89% timing figure, with the comparison systems named.

API pricing, which Nuance has not published.

More personas and languages, and whether the closed areas (healthcare, education, the four US states and Quebec) open.

§ 07 Where CellCog sits #

CellCog AI employees do not have a face. They join Google Meet, Zoom and Microsoft Teams calls with the camera off and speak in their own voice, and they can answer calls on their own phone number. The employee behind the voice is the same one that does the work, with its memory and its tools.

Nuance Labs, Meet Emma, the First Nuplex Persona , November 9, 2026

Fangchang Ma on X (17: 59 UTC, November 9, 2026; 1.3 million views at 02: 06 UTC on November 10)

Nuance Labs, Nuplex Beta API and press page

Kyutai, Moshi: a speech-text foundation model for real-time dialogue , one of the open full-duplex models Nuance compares against

At emma.nuancelabs.ai. Nuance says no account is needed. It is for adults only and is not available in every region.

Q 2 Where is Emma available?

The United States except Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois and Texas, the EU, the UK, and Canada except Quebec, per Nuance.

Q 3 Can developers build on it?

Yes. The Nuplex Beta API offers a few personas that you brief with your own prompt. Pricing is not published in what we read.

Q 4 Can I use my own face or voice?

Not by yourself. Nuance says the beta cannot clone people. Custom faces are by arrangement, with the person’s explicit permission.

Q 5 Do CellCog AI employees have a face?

No. They join calls with the camera off and speak in their own voice.