The Mental health treatment landscape is about to be transformed by artificial intelligence (AI-Mental health). Whether you are a Mental health provider or a person interested in Mental health services, AI is changing the way that treatments are provided, the patient-centered care options that are available to consumers, and how we evaluate the benefits of treatment. Here is a quick glimpse of this already-emerging future.

In the AI-Mental health era, people will soon be able to^1-2:

1. Customize the demographic characteristics, voice, and even personality of their AI-Mental health therapist.
2. Enjoy more democratized treatment, meaning lower costs for Mental health care (e.g., subscription plans instead of $150/hour therapy rates), portability, and having 24-7 access to their AI-Mental health therapist.
3. Reduce their fears about Mental health treatment stigma by working with an AI instead of a human therapist.
4. If preferred, augment rather than replace their human Mental health therapist with AI features that can help people make positive changes between treatment sessions (i.e., AI-assisted mental healthcare). These features could include AI-created summaries of treatment sessions, using AI to help generate therapy content, obtain assistance with and reminders about goals, and increase accountability and motivation on days between therapy sessions.

Meanwhile, Mental health providers can look forward to^3-4:

1. Offering lower-cost Mental health assistance to consumers seeking maintenance treatment after therapy or experiencing less severe Mental health symptoms (e.g., stress management and health coaching versus major depressive disorder).
2. Improving the quality and experience of Mental health treatment by offering AI tools to bridge days between sessions with self-help tools, reminders, and therapy exercises.
3. Increasing their ability to monitor the Mental health symptoms of their patients and provide rapid information or self-help assistance to those experiencing increases in symptoms.
4. Collecting between-session feedback from patients to help them to personalize and adjust their treatments.

The above future is neither imaginary nor distant. In fact, the first stages of this AI-Mental health treatment era are already here, in the form of a growing number of AI Mental health apps and start-up companies.

At present, consumers can interact with AI Mental health tools primarily through smartphone apps and computers. However, these formats will likely expand to include AI-Mental health features in 1) smart wearables (e.g., an Apple Watch with AI Mental health features that monitor mood through skin conductance and heart rate variability); 2) virtual reality headsets using generative AI to create relaxation experiences or graded exposure exercises; 3) AI-enhanced smart beds (e.g., an Eight Sleep smart bed that combines sleep monitoring technology with AI features to generate personalized music, stories, or sounds for treating insomnia); and even 4) automobiles (e.g., car seats and steering wheels can monitor stress levels and use AI to provide self-help interventions, information, or generative music and video content to reduce driving stress and road rage symptoms).

Even our most hated technologies—such as the dreaded bathroom scale—could potentially become a source of motivation, personal growth, and learning if enhanced by the right AI features. And the above list doesn’t even include some of the most promising AI Mental health applications of all: personalized AI pets and robots.

AI possibilities meet AI perils

The promise and advantages of AI-Mental health naturally come with a lot of fine print. To many people, for example, interacting with AI in any form for Mental health would be aversive. Perhaps even terrifying. And the technological wonders of AI for Mental health remain mirrored by legitimate concerns about data privacy, bad advice, and incorrect information (“AI hallucinations”), increases in loneliness and social disconnection, and even fears of addiction (see the movie Her for an example of AI relationship dystopia) as we’ve seen occur with social media.

Finally, it is important to recognize that AI-Mental health isn’t yet ready to replace all aspects of human therapists. Instead, AI-Mental health is best equipped in the near term to assist with the technical aspects of Mental health treatment. This includes delivering evidence-based treatment protocols, sharing expert education and informational resources, providing real-time and rapid feedback, and collecting data about symptoms and the effects of treatment.

These “technical” aspects of therapy are complemented by the “relational” aspects of therapy that AI-Mental health will be slower to duplicate, such as trust, connection, rapport, and other “non-specific” qualities that research shows are so important to great mental healthcare.

Can AI-Mental health ever manage to develop a bedside manner to match its peerless knowledge and procedural abilities? Time will tell. And we may not have long to wait.