Twitter has been teasing, testing, and launching different subscription tiers since Elon Musk took over the company last year, but he's not done yet.
Musk tweeted that Twitter, now known as X, will offer two new tiers of X Premium (previously Twitter Blue) subscriptions: "One is lower cost with all features, but no reduction in ads, and the other is more expensive, but has no ads," he wrote. He didn't say how much these tiers will cost. X Premium is currently $8 per month.
Earlier this month, Bloomberg reported that X was testing three subscription tiers: Basic, Standard, and Plus. In that setup, the Basic plan would show the normal amount of ads, Standard would reduce them by half, and Plus would remove them entirely. (X Premium currently offers "half ads.")
X is also testing a $1-per-year subscription model for any non-X Premium member who wants to tweet or retweet content on the platform. The move is intended to cut down on bots (the idea being that only legit people have credit cards, apparently), and is currently being tested in New Zealand and the Philippines.
X has struggled to earn money since Musk's takeover. X CEO Linda Yaccarino says that the platform is profit-positive minus its debt payments, according to Bloomberg, and that 90% of its advertisers have come back, though spending is not what it once was.
The tiered approach, meanwhile, is a familiar one, especially among video streamers like Netflix. Thus far, social networks haven't embraced it, however, with Meta's collection of apps sticking with advertising beyond creator-level subscription offerings.
