Elon Musk, owner of X, said last month that the platform formerly known as Twitter would probably introduce a subscription fee for all its users. The idea was to eliminate bots.
In recent days, the story has taken a new turn after Bloomberg reported that the company is testing three subscription tiers, where the goal is to see fewer ads the more you pay.
Insiders familiar with the matter have told Bloomberg that the changes could divide the current Premium tier, which costs $8 per month, into Basic, Standard, and Plus.
According to other recent leaks, the Basic tier will display the usual number of ads, the Standard tier will show half the ads, and the top-tier Plus will be ad-free. Currently, the Premium tier displays half as many ads as the free tier.
The prices for the three payment tiers are not known yet
With this configuration, it’s also unclear whether a free tier will continue to exist, and if so, whether it will display even more ads than it does now. Making it paid for all users would drive away bots and hundreds of millions of genuine users.
That’s why X might keep its free tier and simultaneously offer a low-cost basic tier with some advantages to encourage sign-ups.
The idea of making Twitter permanently paid only makes sense if introducing fees for all accounts would make it more costly for bot operators to create fake accounts, and the hassle of setting up a new payment method for each account would also help combat this practice. In that case, it’s difficult to see how a free tier can be sustained.
The eccentric billionaire also hopes that subscriptions for all will help increase X’s profits while continuing efforts to encourage advertisers to return to the platform after many abandoned it following his company’s $44 billion acquisition.
X has not provided any official information about its potential new subscription tiers, but recent reports and leaks suggest that something is in the works. We will update the information if there are any changes.
