Elon Musk pledges to open source X algorithm in seven days amid mounting regulatory pressure

Elon Musk Says X to Make Its Algorithm Open Source in Seven Days

The company has been working to incorporate more artificial intelligence into its recommendation algorithm for X, using Grok, Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot. Social media platform X will open its new algorithm to the public in seven days, Elon Musk said on Saturday, including the code used to decide what posts and advertisements are recommended to users. "This will be repeated every 4 weeks, with comprehensive developer notes, to help you understand what changed," Musk, who owns X, said in a postBloomberg Terminal on the platform. The billionaire didn't say why X was making its algorithm open source. He and the company have clashed several times with regulators over content being shown to users. Some X users had previously complained that they were receiving fewer posts on the social media platform from people they follow. In October, Musk confirmed in a post on X that the company had found a "significant bug" in the platform's "For You" algorithm and pledged a fix. The company has also been working to incorporate more artificial intelligence into its recommendation algorithm for X, using Grok, Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot. Musk has promised in recent years to make some of X's algorithms public, but the follow-through has been spotty. In September, Musk wrote that the goal was for X's recommendation engine to "be purely AI" and that the company would share its open source algorithm about every two weeks. "To the degree that people are seeing improvements in their feed, it is not due to the actions of specific individuals changing heuristics, but rather increasing use of Grok and other AI tools," Musk wrote in October. The company was working to have all of the more than 100 million daily posts published to X evaluated by Grok, which would then offer individual users the posts most likely to interest them, Musk wrote. "This will profoundly improve the quality of your feed." He added that the company was planning to roll out the new features by November. Grok's image-generation capabilities have faced criticism from global regulators over a recent flood of AI-generated images that sexualize women and children on X. As of Friday, Grok told users on X that they would need a paid subscription to generate and edit images. Those features were initially introduced on X for free with daily limits. Indonesia blocked access to Grok after an investigation into the AI system's generation of sexual content. This week, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer demanded Musk's X urgently "get their act together" over the sexualized images. Technology Secretary Liz Kendall warned in a statement on Friday the government could "block services from being accessed in the UK, if they refuse to comply with UK law." European regulators in particular have stepped up scrutiny of the company with a focus on misinformation, inadequate content moderation and shortcomings in transparency. In July, the French authorities asked the company to share its algorithm as part of a probe into allegations of bias and manipulation. X at the time said it would not comply with the request, accusing the investigation of being politically motivated.

Elon Musk promises to open-source X's algorithm in the next few days

Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. TL;DR: Elon Musk says the algorithm that determines what appears in each user's X feed will be made public within a week - a move he claims will bring transparency to the platform's inner workings. The release, he says, will include all the code responsible for recommending both organic posts and sponsored ads, along with developer notes documenting changes every four weeks. The announcement marks the latest in a string of commitments from Musk to open-source the technology behind X's recommendation engine. Previous promises, however, have seen uneven follow-through. The company's last significant algorithm release dates back to 2023, when a repository appeared on GitHub showing portions of the platform's feed-ranking logic. That codebase has not been meaningfully updated in three years, and its relevance to today's system is minimal. The new algorithm reportedly draws heavily on Grok. X has increasingly integrated Grok into the recommendation pipeline, using it to decide which of the platform's 100 million daily posts users are most likely to engage with. According to Musk, improvements in the feed are no longer the result of manual tweaks by engineers but rather a function of Grok's adaptive models. In late 2025, Musk said the goal was to make X's recommendation engine "purely AI." Grok now analyzes vast amounts of user interaction data: likes, reposts, and viewing time, to predict what each person is most likely to find engaging. Those predictions shape not only the "For You" timeline but also the ordering of advertisements and suggested accounts. Updates to the model are expected every few weeks, with changes logged for developers and researchers to review. Musk's announcement comes as users grow increasingly frustrated with irrelevant content. In October, X confirmed what it described as a "significant bug" in the For You algorithm that caused posts from accounts users follow to appear less frequently. The company said it had fixed the issue, though some users report ongoing irregularities in what they see. Musk's open-source pledge also comes as X and xAI face escalating scrutiny over Grok's image-generation features. The AI system, which can create and edit images, has been accused of producing sexualized depictions of women and minors. The backlash has been global. Indonesia blocked access to Grok after investigations into AI-generated sexual content, while UK officials demanded the company curb the spread of similar material. British Technology Secretary Liz Kendall warned that the government could block X's services entirely if it fails to comply with UK law. Musk's public response to these demands has been combative; he accused the UK of "fascist" overreach in a post on the platform. Meanwhile, the original Grok-1 repository, published in early 2024, has not seen updates in nearly two years, while internal versions have advanced to Grok-3. The discrepancy raises persistent questions about how much of the underlying technology Musk is willing (or able) to release publicly. If the upcoming algorithm release does include the entire stack behind X's content recommendations, as Musk now promises, it would represent one of the most detailed disclosures ever made by a major social network. But given the company's uneven history with transparency, many observers remain skeptical.

Musk vows to open source X algorithm in 7 days amid EU scrutiny

Elon Musk announced on X that the platform will open source its new recommendation algorithm, including all code for organic and advertising post recommendations, in seven days. Musk made the statement on Saturday via a post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, which he acquired in 2022. The algorithm determines the content users see in their feeds, specifically what organic posts from accounts they follow and paid advertising content appear. The recommendation system has faced investigations from French authorities and the European Commission. The Commission issued a retention order to X at the start of 2023 and recently extended it through 2026, requiring the company to preserve certain data for regulatory review. Scrutiny of X has grown following incidents involving its AI chatbot, Grok. The chatbot generated child sexual abuse material, known as CSAM, in response to user requests. It has also been used to create non-consensual digital undressing images of women, prompting demands for greater accountability on content moderation and algorithmic transparency. Musk first promised to open source the algorithm after taking over Twitter. In 2023, X published code for the "For You" feed on GitHub. Analyses at the time found the code lacking key details on how recommendations were generated. The repository has not received updates since its initial release. Regarding the upcoming release, Musk stated in his post, "This will be repeated every 4 weeks, with comprehensive developer notes, to help you understand what changed." This plan aims to provide ongoing transparency into algorithm modifications.

Musk to open new X algorithm for public in seven days: Report

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said that he will open the new X algorithm to the public in seven days. It will include all code for organic and advertising post recommendations. "We will publish the full algorithm in a week. Still much to improve. It's just trying to show you what you are most likely to find interesting. The goal is to maximise unregretted user-seconds," Musk said. "This will be repeated every 4 weeks, with comprehensive developer notes, to help you understand what changed," he posted on X. The world's richest man didn't say why X was making its algorithm open source. He and the company have clashed several times with regulators over content being shown to users. The decision comes as the European Commission has decided to extend a retention order sent to X last year, which related to algorithms and dissemination of illegal content. Some X users had previously complained that they were receiving fewer posts on the social media platform from people they follow. In October, Musk confirmed in a post on X that the company had found a "significant bug" in the platform's "For You" algorithm and pledged a fix. The company has also been working to incorporate more artificial intelligence into its recommendation algorithm for X, using Grok. Meanwhile, Musk's artificial intelligence startup, xAI, has announced the completion of a $20 billion funding round from investors including Nvidia, Valor Equity Partners and the Qatar Investment Authority. The company did not disclose individual investment amounts or the split between debt and equity, and named Stepstone Group, Fidelity Management & Research, MGX, Baron Capital Group and Cisco Systems Inc.'s investment group among other investors who participated in the funding. xAI had planned for roughly $7.5 billion of equity and up to $12.5 billion of debt parked in a special purpose vehicle to buy Nvidia processors. The chips would be rented out for five years, allowing financiers to recoup their investment, according to reports.