What Is Grok AI? Who Owns It, What It Does and What It Costs (2026)

What is Grok AI? Grok AI is an AI chatbot and a family of large language models built by xAI, the Elon Musk company that SpaceX bought in February 2026. You use it on grok.com, in the Grok apps, inside X and in Tesla cars. It chats, searches the web and X in real time, writes code and makes images and video. The current model is Grok 4.7, released on September 21, 2026.

Grok is no longer a side project of a social network. SpaceX reports that about 117 million people a month used Grok's AI features as of March 31, 2026. That sits inside roughly 550 million monthly users across Grok and X combined. About 1.9 million of them paid for a SuperGrok plan. The company behind it has changed its name twice in three months, from xAI to SpaceXAI and now to SpaceXSI. This guide covers what Grok is, who owns it, what it does well, which models it runs, what the free tier gets and what the paid plans cost now that The X Subscription is replacing SuperGrok.

The Key Takeaways

• Grok is an AI chatbot made by xAI, which Elon Musk founded in 2023. It launched on November 3, 2023 and is built around real-time access to X.
• SpaceX owns Grok. SpaceX completed its acquisition of xAI on February 2, 2026, and Musk holds about 82.4% of SpaceX's voting power after its June 2026 IPO.
• xAI is now called SpaceXSI (SpaceX Super Intelligence). It became SpaceXAI in July 2026, and Musk confirmed the second rename on October 4, 2026.
• Free Grok runs the Fast mode only. Expert and Heavy, both labelled Grok 4.7, need a paid plan.
• The X Subscription is replacing SuperGrok. Launched on October 12, 2026, it bundles Grok, Cursor and X perks: Plus $8, Premium $30, Super $100 and Ultra $200 a month.

What Is Grok AI?

Grok AI is a general-purpose AI assistant from xAI that answers questions, writes, codes, analyses images and documents, and generates images and video. Its defining feature is a live connection to X, the social network formerly called Twitter, plus web search. Where most chatbots answer from their training data, Grok can read what people are posting on X right now.

xAI introduced Grok on November 3, 2023, describing it as "an AI modeled after the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" with "a bit of wit" and "a rebellious streak". The same announcement named "real-time knowledge of the world via the 𝕏 platform" as Grok's "unique and fundamental advantage". The tone has stayed part of the product, and so has the X connection.

Grok is two things under one name. It is the chatbot you talk to in an app, and it is the model family developers call through the xAI API. The chatbot names modes (Fast, Expert, Heavy), while the API names model versions (grok-4.7, grok-4.6).

Most confusion about Grok comes from mixing the two.

How Does Grok AI Work?

Grok AI works like other chatbots. A large language model predicts a reply from your prompt, and tools such as web search, X search and code execution feed it fresh information. What changes the answer is which mode you pick and how much data from X it pulls in.

On grok.com, Grok offers four modes. Fast gives "quick responses" and is the default. Expert "thinks hard" on Grok 4.7. Heavy runs a "team of experts" on Grok 4.7, which Grok's plans page describes as a "larger team of agents collaborating" on one answer. Auto chooses between Fast and Expert for you. These labels come straight from the mode picker on grok.com, read on October 11, 2026.

The data side is what sets Grok apart. SpaceX's IPO prospectus says Grok's "real-time data integration, particularly through insights derived from the X platform" sets it apart from OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. The same filing says public X data also feeds Grok's training. The models train and run on xAI's own Colossus and Colossus II data centres.

Who Owns Grok?

SpaceX owns Grok. SpaceX completed its acquisition of xAI, the company that builds Grok, on February 2, 2026, and xAI became a wholly owned subsidiary. Elon Musk controls SpaceX, so Musk controls Grok, but through SpaceX shares rather than owning the chatbot directly.

The ownership chain took three years to assemble. The dates below come from SpaceX's own SEC filings, its 10-Q for the quarter to June 30, 2026 and its IPO prospectus.

Does Elon Musk Own Grok?

Elon Musk controls Grok but does not own it personally. Grok belongs to SpaceX. SpaceX's IPO prospectus says Musk would hold about 82.4% of the voting power of its common stock once the offering closed, through Class B shares that carry ten votes each. The prospectus says that stake gives him the power to control the outcome of shareholder votes, including board elections, so in practice Grok's direction is his call. Musk founded xAI in 2023 and is SpaceX's chief executive, chief technical officer and chairman. For the wider picture of his companies, see our profile of Elon Musk.

Is Grok Owned by X?

No, X does not own Grok. It ran the other way: xAI acquired X in March 2025, so X became a subsidiary of the company that makes Grok. Today both sit inside the AI segment of SpaceX, which the 10-Q describes as "a frontier LLM Grok, AI solutions for consumer and enterprise customers, X" and AI compute infrastructure.

What Are SpaceXAI and SpaceXSI?

SpaceXAI and SpaceXSI are the two new names of xAI. On July 6, 2026, Business Insider reported that xAI had "officially rebranded to SpaceXAI", with a new logo and a new X handle. Three months later, on October 4, 2026, Musk posted "No more AI", then "SI", then "It's better". Asked whether SpaceXAI would become SpaceXSI, he replied "Yes, we will make that change."

The new name is already live. xAI's developer documentation now titles itself "SpaceXSI Docs". grok.com describes Grok as "an AI assistant built by SpaceXSI". The company's X account is now @SpaceXSI, with the display name "SpaceX Super Intelligence".

The legal footer on x.ai still reads SpaceXAI LLC, so the rename is a brand change first. Grok itself keeps its name through all of it.

Is Grok Publicly Traded?

Grok has no stock of its own, but its parent does. SpaceX listed on Nasdaq under the ticker SPCX in June 2026 and sold 638.9 million Class A shares at $135.00 each, according to its 10-Q. Buying SPCX gets you exposure to Grok, X, Cursor, Starlink and the rockets all at once. Nothing public points to a separate Grok listing.

Why Is It Called Grok?

Grok is named after the word "grok", which the science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein coined in his 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land. In the book it is a Martian word, and the Oxford English Dictionary sums it up as "to understand intuitively or by empathy". The name fits xAI's stated mission. SpaceX's prospectus describes Grok as "a truth-seeking AI model, built on our founder Elon Musk's mission to enable humanity to understand the universe."

Grok is not related to Groq, the AI inference chip company. The names sound the same, but the companies and products are separate.

What Can Grok AI Do?

Grok AI can chat, search the web and X, write code, read images and PDFs, and generate images and video. It also holds voice conversations and runs agents that work on your behalf. xAI has added a new product surface almost every month in 2026, so the list below groups them by job.

Chat and Real-Time Search

Chat is the core of Grok. It answers questions, drafts text, summarises long documents and explains unfamiliar topics. Since December 2024 Grok has drawn on "posts from 𝕏 and webpages from the broader internet" with citations, according to xAI. That makes it strong on breaking news, trending topics and what people are saying about a product or an event. It is also the reason accuracy depends on what is circulating on X at the time.

Coding and Grok Build

Coding is the main focus of Grok 4.7 and of Grok Build, xAI's coding agent. xAI calls Grok 4.7 "our most capable model for coding and knowledge work", and its launch post benchmarks it on CursorBench and DeepSWE. Grok Build launched as a command-line tool in May 2026 and went open source on July 15, 2026. Since August 14, 2026, SpaceX also owns Cursor, one of the most widely used AI code editors.

Images and Video With Grok Imagine

Grok Imagine makes images and short videos from text or a reference picture. It runs its own models, grok-imagine-image-2.0 and grok-imagine-video-1.5, not the Grok 4.7 chat model. Every paid tier of The X Subscription includes Grok Imagine, and xAI's pricing page lists AI images and videos among the Premium features. Under the old SuperGrok plan, video ran at 720p and up to 30 seconds.

Voice, Agents and Office Add-Ins

Grok also handles voice conversations, runs agents and works inside Microsoft Office. xAI ships its own voice models, Grok Voice 3.0 and Grok Voice Transcribe 2.0, and added 21 new flagship Grok voices in July 2026. In the summer of 2026 it added Grok add-ins for Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook. On August 11, 2026, it launched Grok Bot, a separate agent product that works in its own cloud computer instead of a chat window. Grok Bot and the Grok chatbot share a name but are different products.

The Current Grok Models (October 2026)

The current Grok model is Grok 4.7, released on September 21, 2026. xAI says it uses "a new, larger base model" than Grok 4.6 and is "served at the same price and speed". It powers the Expert and Heavy modes in the Grok app and is the flagship on the API. According to Grok's release notes, Grok 4.7 has powered Expert mode on grok.com since October 3, 2026, along with Fast mode for paid subscribers. The grok.com plans page still advertises Grok 4.6.

The API price doubles to $4 input and $12 output per million tokens once a prompt passes 200,000 tokens, according to xAI's pricing page. Older models such as Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5 and Grok 4.3 remain on the API. For what changed in the latest release and what it costs per task, read our Grok 4.7 review.

Where You Can Use Grok

You can use Grok on grok.com, in the Grok apps for iPhone and Android, inside X, in Tesla cars and through the xAI API. grok.com is the full chatbot in a browser, with the mode picker and Grok Imagine. The iOS and Android apps carry the same features on a phone. Inside X, Grok is built into the app and website, and a Grok button on posts lets you ask about any of them. In Tesla cars it is a hands-free voice assistant, covered below. Developers call the same models through the xAI API.

xAI's download links cover iOS, Android and X but not a Mac chat app, so on a Mac the usual route is grok.com in a browser. Our guide to the Grok desktop client for Mac covers the options. One of them is Fello AI, which puts Grok next to ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and DeepSeek in one native app for Mac, iPhone and iPad. You can ask Grok and check its answer against another model in the same window.

What Is Grok in Tesla?

Grok in Tesla is a hands-free voice assistant built into the car's software. Tesla's support page lists the Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y and Cybertruck. The car needs an AMD processor, software version 2025.26 or later, and Premium Connectivity or Wi-Fi.

You start it from the App Launcher or by holding the microphone button on the steering wheel. No Grok account or subscription is needed. You can choose Grok's voice and personality, from "Storyteller" to "Unhinged", and since software 2025.44.25 it can set navigation destinations. It cannot control the car itself: Tesla says Grok "does not include voice commands for vehicle controls such as media or climate". Tesla still labels the feature a beta.

Is Grok AI Free?

Yes, Grok AI has a free tier, but it only includes the Fast mode. On grok.com, Auto, Expert and Heavy each show an upgrade prompt. For exactly what the free plan includes and where it runs out, see is Grok AI free.

What Is SuperGrok, and What Replaced It?

SuperGrok was Grok's standalone paid subscription. SpaceX's prospectus defines it as a "subscription-based Grok service that provides users with expanded access to Grok models and related tools". It unlocked Expert mode and raised the limits on chat, images, video and voice, in four tiers: Lite $10, SuperGrok $30, Plus $100 and Heavy $300 a month. Only Heavy bundled X Premium+, the paid tier of the X social network.

On October 12, 2026, xAI introduced The X Subscription, one plan that "brings together Grok, Grok Bot, Cursor, and X Premium". New customers can buy it from launch day, and xAI says it will reach everyone globally "over the next few days". Existing SuperGrok, Cursor and X Premium subscribers can keep their current plan, or switch and get a prorated refund for the old one. The switch is permanent, so read what switching to The X Subscription involves before you accept it. xAI's pricing page now lists only the new tiers, although grok.com/plans still showed the SuperGrok plans on October 14.

Prices are from x.ai/pricing and exclude tax. Usage is one pool shared across Grok and Cursor that refreshes weekly, and xAI says Premium carries "the benefits of SuperGrok, Cursor Pro, and X Premium+, previously $90/month combined". Paid plans include Grok API access, but API calls are billed separately at standard model rates. SpaceX's prospectus counted about 1.9 million paid SuperGrok, Heavy and Lite subscribers as of March 31, 2026. For the Teams plan, API prices and how the old and new tiers line up, read our full guide to Grok pricing.

Is Grok Safe?

Grok is safe to use for everyday questions, but it has a more troubled record than most chatbots, and you should check its answers on contested topics. Three problems stand out.

First, Grok has produced extreme content in public. In July 2025, after what xAI called a system update, the @grok account on X posted antisemitic replies that praised Hitler, as CNN and others reported. xAI apologised for the "horrific behavior". Our report on the Grok 4 Hitler controversy covers what happened. Second, its image tools were used to make sexualised images of real people. SpaceX's 10-Q says that since January 2026 the company has been named in "multiple lawsuits arising from Grok's image-generation and editing features".

Third, because Grok reads X in real time, a false story that goes viral on X can end up in its answer.

The practical rule is simple. Use Grok for news, trends and coding. Check anything political, medical or legal against a second source.

What Makes Grok AI Different From ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini

Grok AI differs from ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini in three ways: live X data, a looser tone and ownership by a rocket company that builds its own compute. It is not simply a cheaper ChatGPT.

Live X data. Grok is wired into X, and SpaceX's own filing names that real-time X data as Grok's main edge over OpenAI, Anthropic and Google. Tone. Grok was built to have "a rebellious streak", and its Tesla version even offers an "Unhinged" personality. ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini default to a more neutral voice. Ownership. Grok sits inside SpaceX, which also owns Starlink, the Colossus data centres that train Grok, and the Cursor code editor.

For head-to-head tests, read Grok vs ChatGPT, and for the company behind Claude, see what is Claude AI.

What Is Grok AI Best For?

Grok is the chatbot to pick when the question is about what is happening right now, because no rival reads X the way it does. xAI says Grok 4.7 sits at the frontier on price-performance for coding, and the free Fast mode costs nothing to try. The trade-off is trust: Grok's answers reflect what is on X, its safety record includes public incidents and active lawsuits, and one controlling shareholder decides how it behaves. Try the free tier on a news question you already know the answer to. If you want to pay, xAI recommends Premium at $30 for new AI users, and that is the tier with Grok Bot, the latest models and video. Plus at $8 is the cheapest paid tier, and xAI pitches it at social creators with light AI use.

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