X’s Algorithm Is Shifting to a Grok-Powered AI Model

X’s algorithm will soon be fully powered by xAI’s Grok system, which should improve the quality of the posts that are highlighted to users in the app. Which could have a big impact on engagement, but then again, it may not matter all that much, depending on one key factor.

First off, on the change itself. Over the weekend, X owner Elon Musk announced that X’s feed algorithm will soon be fully powered by xAI’s Grok system.

As per Musk:

“The X recommendation system is evolving very rapidly. We are aiming for deletion of all heuristics within 4 to 6 weeks. Grok will literally read every post and watch every video (100M+ per day) to match users with content they’re most likely to find interesting.”

To clarify on the volume point, back in 2023, X reported that it sees 100 million original posts in the app every day, along with 100 million replies to posts, and 300 million quote posts and re-posts.

Presumably, based on Elon’s comment here, that figure hasn’t increased in the past two years, which is an interesting note on X’s broader growth.

But back to the main focus. Elon says that the updated xAI algorithm should help to address X’s new user and/or small account problem, “where you post something great, but nobody sees it.”

“We will also be adding the ability for you to adjust your feed temporarily or permanently just by asking Grok.”

Elon’s been talking about these coming changes for a while, so there’s not really anything new here, as such. But conceptually at least, X’s recommendations could be about to get a whole lot better, based on AI understanding.

So will that work, and help to boost user engagement and time spent in the app?

Well, a significant consideration in this case is the fact that on X, you can set your “Following” feed as your default, and bypass the algorithmic “For You” feed altogether. Which is good for user choice, and giving people more control over their in-app experience. But for X itself, it means that all of its efforts to improve its recommendations are lost on users who never switch over to the algorithmic feed.

X does try to nudge you over to the “For You” tab, by opening up to it every now and then, even if you’ve set “Following” as your default. But to get a real sense of the impact of any X algorithm and recommendation update, we’d also need data on how many users are actually ever checking the “For You” feed.

Which we don’t have. X only shares very limited usage data and stats, so we don’t know whether a significant percentage of people are defaulting to their curated “Following” feed, as opposed to letting X show them content they might like.

Which makes this much harder to assess than, say, Instagram or TikTok, which don’t let you set your following tab as your default. Because of this, any algorithm tweaks on those apps can have a broad impact.

It could be less so for X, though as Musk says, it should, at least in theory, help smaller creators get more exposure, and it should help you get your posts in front of a more relevant, interested audience. So long as those people are using the “For You” feed.

So in summary, we really have no idea how this will help or hurt your X performance, because we don’t have the data to indicate how many of X’s claimed 600 million monthly actives ever use the “For You” stream.

So maybe this is significant, but then again…

I guess, a potentially significant change on this front would be X eventually forcing people to use the “For You” feed as the default, which it may well do if X is really confident in its AI-powered recommendations.

Maybe that will be the next step.