Elon Musk’s xAI sues Apple and OpenAI over antitrust claims

Macworld

On Monday, Elon Musk’s X Corp (the social network formerly known at Twitter) and xAI (which makes the Grok AI products) sued both Apple and OpenAI in federal court. Both X Corp and xAI are owned by parent company X.AI Holdings Corp, after Musk sold X to X.AI back in March of 2025.

The case was filed in the Northern District court of Texas, Fort Worth Division, a court known for being so friendly to conservatives that some have accused it of making slanted decisions in defiance of legal precedent–it is a frequent target of “judge shopping” for conservative cases and causes.

The 61-page filing (PDF) makes several claims against both Apple and OpenAI, accusing the companies of conspiring together to eliminate competition in the AI industry. It says that AI is “the most powerful technology humanity has ever created” and says that Apple and OpenAI’s arrangement makes it impossible for any other AI company to compete. Further, it claims that Apple has “deprioritized” other AI chatbots and “super apps” (like X) in the App Store, and dragged out the app review process for those apps.

It demands a trial by jury (yes, it closes by saying “Plaintiffs hereby demand a trial by jury.”) and seeks a permanent injunction, monetary damages paid, punitive damages paid, with pre- and post-judgement interest, and cost of legal fees for the suit.

At the time of this writing, OpenAI’s ChatGPT app holds the top slot on the iOS App Store’s free apps rankings. Grok is ranked 22nd, while X is ranked 28th. Apple previously defended the App Store algorithm as “fair and free of bias,” after Musk called out the rankings in a post on X.

The suit alleges that Apple’s arrangement with OpenAI to integrated ChatGPT into iOS 18 prevents X.AI from competing. When ChatGPT integration was announced at WWDC in 2024, Apple said, “we also intend to add support for other AI models in the future.” What that has not happened yet, there are persistent rumors that Google’s Gemini will be added as an AI integration option in the coming months.