Elon Musk’s xAI is testing out a standalone iOS app for Grok

Grok was only available to all X users up until recently. Now, Musk and the company are planning to make it publicly accessible as a separate app on iOS. This is positioning xAI to compete with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. 

The app can receive real-time data from the web and X and is now live in Australia and a few other countries in beta. It has generative AI features like rewriting text, summarizing long paragraphs, and a little Q&A, and it can also make images from text prompts.

BREAKING

Grok will have a stand alone app. pic.twitter.com/eYI6TIGbmr

— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) December 23, 2024

xAI is also working on a website called Grok.com that will let people use the chatbot on the web. When you log in with an xAI account right now, the page says “coming soon.”

Other AI chatbots have standalone apps; Grok doesn’t

Unlike competitors like OpenAI that already have standalone apps for Android and iOS, Grok is exclusively available on X (previously Twitter). Grok’s integration with X gives it an edge in pulling real-time data directly from a widely used social platform.

In addition, Grok is promoted by xAI as a versatile AI assistant with fewer restrictions than competitors. 

The company highlighted that Grok’s image-generator model excels at “photorealistic rendering” and doesn’t apply major limitations on its image-generation capabilities. This allows users to create images using pictures of public figures and copyrighted material.

Upload images to Grok. You will be amazed at what it can figure out!

And it gets better every week. https://t.co/FCl0xsN7hq

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 22, 2024

The goal is to attract users looking for greater capabilities. To make it more accessible, the company started testing a free version of the chatbot and rolled it out to all X users earlier this month.

In addition, the new platform lets users access real-time data from the internet and X, as well as generative AI capabilities like rewriting text and summarizing long paragraphs.

Grok’s listing describes the app as “an AI-powered assistant designed to be maximally truthful, useful, and curious.”

Musk’s AI product has become incredibly competitive, according to Sam Altman, the co-founder of Open AI, who recently mentioned that Musk wants to have the biggest AI in the world as he spoke about their ongoing dispute. 

AI in 2025 with Musk in Trump’s administration

The inauguration of a new administration in the United States will result in several policy and strategy changes regarding AI. Given Musk’s current central position in the AI world, it may be tempting to concentrate on the president-elect’s close relationship with Elon Musk in order to predict the direction of the AI winds under President Trump.

Looking at Musk’s highly adversarial relationship with OpenAI, the next administration may take a less sympathetic approach to OpenAI when it engages the industry. Musk could have a hand in AI regulations and awarding government contracts. This is an actual risk that OpenAI is concerned about today. 

On the other hand, the Trump administration may selectively benefit Musk’s own enterprises, such as reducing red tape to allow xAI to build data centers and gain a competitive advantage in the frontier model race. It could also help Tesla with speedy regulatory approval to deploy its robotaxi fleet.

More importantly, Elon Musk, unlike many other technology CEOs with Trump’s ear, takes existential AI safety threats very seriously and hence advocates for extensive AI regulation. For example,  he backed California’s contentious SB 1047 bill, which aimed to impose significant restrictions on AI developers.

Therefore, Musk’s influence could lead to a stricter regulatory environment for AI in the United States.

However, Donald Trump and Elon Musk are both unpredictable and complex individuals. The mutual benefits of their newfound companionship have been evident thus far, however, it is currently in its honeymoon phase. 

Predictions indicate that the relationship will have deteriorated prior to the conclusion of 2025. What implications will this have for the field of AI?

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