<p>The increasing prominence of virtual entertainers (VEs) has generated considerable interest from both academia and practitioners. This study investigates whether VEs can perform as effectively as human entertainers (HEs) in driving viewer purchase intentions for entertainment products and the products they advertise. Grounded in persuasion theory, this research examines the roles of physical attractiveness, social attractiveness, attitude homophily, and trustworthiness in shaping consumers’ purchase intentions. Results from a text mining and a survey experiment suggest that while there are some linguistic differences in the verbal reactions to VEs’ and HEs’ performances, physical attractiveness and social attractiveness significantly influence trustworthiness across both VEs and HEs, but attitude homophily enhances trustworthiness only for HEs. Trustworthiness was found to be significantly associated with purchase intentions for music in both groups, with emotional arousal moderating this relationship. A multi-group analysis identified minimal differences between the VE and HE groups for the hypothesized relationships.</p>