X algorithm changed in July to boost right-wing accounts, study finds

The algorithm of X, a microblogging platform, was modified in mid-July – after its owner Elon Musk endorsed Donald Trump for US president – to systematically boost Republican-leaning accounts, a new study has found.

Musk is now really close to Trump. The billionaire follows the President-elect on his travels and will co-lead a new “Department of Government Efficiency.” Clearly, Trump believes Musk deserves all this.

But for what? It’s one thing to claim that Musk has bought X to use the platform for political gains and, plainly speaking, help Trump win – but it’s been difficult to prove whether the new owner has actually done so.

Now, some researchers are finding clues that Musk may indeed have used X to shape online discourse leading up to the election by introducing algorithmic bias into the equation.

A newly released computational study of engagement from the Queensland University of Technology in Australia says that X’s algorithm was changed in mid-July to boost right-wing accounts and Musk’s own page.

The possibility of algorithmic prioritization

The findings are preliminary but they suggest “important questions about the potential impact of algorithmic adjustments on public discourse and the ‘neutrality’ of social media platforms as information carriers.”

The research was conducted in two phases. The first focused on comparing engagement metrics (views, retweets, and followers) for Musk's personal X account and other prominent accounts, while the second one compared Republican-leaning and Democratic-leaning accounts.

The study analyzed 56,184 posts sent by several accounts between January 1st, 2024, and October 25th, 2024, and examined view counts, retweet counts, and favorite counts for each.

Researchers are finding clues that Musk may indeed have used X to shape online discourse leading up to the election by introducing algorithmic bias into the equation.

The analysis found “a structural break for Musk's metrics around July 13th, 2024,” the day Musk formally endorsed Trump. Musk’s post view counts suddenly increased by 138.27%, and retweets increased by 237.94%, with a similarly large increase for favorites.

This was far in excess of the other accounts monitored. The authors of the study conclude that the “unique post-change uplift for Musk’s account suggests the possibility of algorithmic prioritization or bias, positioning Musk’s content favorably in terms of platform visibility and user engagement.”

Next, the researchers wanted to see if engagement boosts were distributed evenly between Republican-leaning and Democrat-leaning accounts. Again, they found a large increase in engagement for right-wing accounts but not for left-wing ones.

No access to information

“This finding suggests a possible recommendation bias favoring Republican content in terms of visibility, potentially via recommendation mechanisms such as the ‘For You’ feed,” says the study.

However, retweet and favorite counts did not display the same group-specific boost. This indicates a more balanced distribution of engagement across political alignments – but it’s difficult to say why.

This is because essentially all studies related to X are now limited – the company has restricted access to its Academic API, and the researchers cannot collect necessary data.

In fact, social media researchers have canceled, suspended or changed more than 100 studies about X as a result, Reuters said last year.

Be that as it may, hundreds of thousands of X users, especially progressives, have already concluded that the platform wasn’t ideologically neutral and actually promoted Musk’s worldview and politics.

The X alternative Bluesky had just nine million users in September but is now home to more than 19 million accounts. With the app rocketing to the top of Apple’s and Google’s app stores, people say they find it refreshing that there’s no algorithmic feed.

Bluesky actually has only 20 full-time employees. According to The New York Times, the small firm now has to work around the clock to deal with the issues that come with hyper-growth: site outages, glitches in the code, and content moderation issues.