Grok is now available without an X account

The year is 2025, which of course means that every tech company must have its own AI bot. X is no exception: Since the end of 2023The site has offered its premium subscribers a chatbot developed by sister company xAI. While Blue Check accounts may benefit from the built-in AI solution, the vast majority of users who have even a passing interest in AI will undoubtedly look for other options, free or not, such as: ChatGPT or Gemini.

Maybe that will change this year: in December xAI has announced a free version of Grokspecifically the latest Grok 2 model, available to anyone with an X account. Today, if you click X on the Grok tab, you can access Grok just like any other chatbot you’ve used before. That’s fine and good for the curious among us who are still on X. But those who have fled to greener pastures could not take advantage of this advantage. That is, until now.

Grok is on iPhone, no X account required

Grok started this week Now available as a free app for iOS-no conditions. You don’t need an X account to use Grok, nor do you need to sign in to an account. (Of course you may Connect your X account or sign in via Apple, Google or email. Once you download the app, you can immediately ask Grok whatever you would ask an AI chatbot. If you don’t log in with X Premium, the app seems to work Similar limitations to the free plan. That’s 10 requests every two hours, with three image analysis requests and four image generations per day.

Now the question naturally becomes: Will people actually use Grok? It is possible. As of this writing, the app is the fourth most popular free app in the iOS App Store – one spot below ChatGPT and well above Gemini at 49. (X is number 31, by the way.) However, I’m a little skeptical about its staying power. I obviously understand that X and Elon Musk fans flock to Grok, but most people interested in AI will, in my opinion, stick with what they know (e.g. ChatGPT) unless, Grok can do something different, better, or both.

I admit Grok is fast: I hadn’t tried it myself before, and the speed with which it responds to text-based queries is impressive. However, I haven’t spent too much time with it yet, so I can’t swear by the accuracy of the results – and as a relative AI skeptic, I probably won’t use it often. The only area where I think Grok has an advantage (and not necessarily in a good way) is the lack of a filter. After all, it is a product from X Corp. This means Grok does not have some of the limitations and restrictions that other services have put in place to prevent abuse. When it comes to image generation, you can do some wild stuff with Grok.

At Lifehacker, the deputy tech editor is Michelle Ehrhardt tested the Grok 2 beta in Augustshe was amazed at some of the images Grok could create: violent, offensive and strange. Even in some quick testing, I was able to get Grok to violate copyrights without having to trick it at all: With Google’s Imagen 3For example, I was able to generate images of Mario by asking the bot to use vague workarounds, such as “an Italian plumber wearing a red hat with the letter M.” Asking it to draw Mario wouldn’t work. Grok is the opposite: try to get around it and it spits out weird images of men wearing Mario’s clothes. Ask it to draw Mario and it will do it – for better or for worse.

Mario was supposed to shoot the Goomba, but I guess Grok had other plans.
Photo credit: Jake Peterson