Elon Musk has clashed with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman several times before, and this time he's directly criticizing Apple's ranking system on its App Store.Deliberately favoring OpenAI, and even stated that this move was an obvious antitrust behavior, and emphasized that its subsidiary xAI would take legal action immediately.
However, Elon Musk did not provide clear evidence that Apple manipulated the App Store rankings, nor did he disclose what legal action he would take in retaliation.
At the same time, Elon Musk also questioned Apple's refusal to include "X" and the chat robot Grok in the essential app rankings, believing that "X" is "the world's number one news app" and questioned whether Grok's ranking of only fifth among all apps was due to deliberate manipulation by Apple.
Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation.
xAI will take immediate legal action.
- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2025
In a subsequent response, Apple emphasized that the App Store's mechanism is completely based on fairness and non-bias. It emphasized that it would list app rankings and make recommendations based on download volume, algorithms, and objective expert standards. In addition to helping developers make their designs visible to more people, it also helps users find apps worth using more easily.
As for OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, he also responded later, saying that Elon Musk's remarks were quite shocking, and mocked Elon Musk for using "X" to promote his company's products and attack competitors and people he disliked.
This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn't like. https://t.co/HlgzO4c2iC
- Sam Altman (@sama) August 12, 2025
However, given Apple's current partnership with OpenAI, OpenAI's AI technology has indeed been incorporated into "Apple Intelligence." Therefore, Elon Musk may use this to accuse Apple and OpenAI, and question whether Apple may give OpenAI extra "courtesy" in app rankings because of their cooperation.
However, given that Apple is currently reportedly in talks to expand its cooperation with AI service providers such as Google, it is clear that if Elon Musk were to accuse Apple of collaborating with OpenAI, it would be difficult for the court to determine that Apple is deliberately favoring OpenAI in its app rankings.
