• News

X is giving Premium features & blue check marks to influential accounts for free

Elon Musk recently teased that influential accounts would get X Premium blue checks and features based on their follower count, almost like a form of verification.

TJ Denzer

April 4, 2024 10:05 AM

Image via X/Twitter

15

For quite a while now, X (formally known as Twitter) has been offering its X Premium services (formerly known as Twitter Blue) to paying subscribers for longer posts, longer video uploads, access to its Grok AI assistant, and priority in timelines and replies. Now, it’s offering those features automatically and for free to influential X accounts if they are over a certain follower count.

Elon Musk teased the idea of giving X Premium features to influential accounts last week, but it only started rolling out today, as shared by CEO Linda Yaccarino and various influential accounts such as that of actor and comedian Roy Wood Jr. From the way Musk himself spun it, influential X accounts with 2,500 followers would be given free access to X Premium features while those with over 5,000 would receive X Premium+ benefits. Where normally, users would have to pay for these features by monthly or yearly subscription, it seems verified and well-known accounts won’t have to worry about that cost anymore.

The move by Musk and his arguably bungled social media platform to offer this service to premium accounts also includes the checkmarks (often referred to as “blue checks”) that once separated paying X subscribers from normal users. In that way, it’s not far different from legacy Twitter verification features which Musk and the company did away with in February 2023. It’s also once again blurring the lines being those who pay for Twitter and those who were verified simply by their notable presence, another area of the platform which was previously an issue to users.

It's a strange move by Musk and X, arguably among many others that have driven advertisers away from the platform and left it a bot-ridden mess of disinformation and pay-to-win bad actors. With notable accounts receiving these features, stay tuned as we continue to follow for further Twitter/X updates.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.