Grok
Is deader than dead
The slop
Is all in your head
Deepfakes and tits
Are all moderated
So fuck all your outrage
Put it to bed
DEADER THAN DEAD
“Grok is a Flop.”
That’s the title that Gizmodo gleefully threw up on a recent article about Grok’s failure to capture a signifiocant market share of users in the ongoing AI wars:
https://gizmodo.com/grok-is-a-flop-but-it-may-not-matter-to-elon-musk-2000757570
And if you’re wondering why the gleeful tone, this paragraph explains it pretty well:
Downloads of Grok’s standalone app have reportedly dropped from 20 million in January to just 8.3 million in April, a drop of nearly 60%. (Let’s try not to read into the fact that the app saw its peak in downloads at the time UndressGate was happening, lest we end up with an even lower opinion of humanity.)
At this point, I am bored with the outrage.
I’ve talked about it already:
But Gizmodo makes some assertions that I’m not sure I agree with, which is why I want to talk about this. Because I think the numbers have some implications for the future of NSFW / adult content on Grok as a platform
THE SLOP IS ALL IN YOUR HEAD
In their article, Gizmodo cites a decline in usership in Grok:
Grok’s usership also declined on web, with average daily website visits worldwide falling from 10.5 million in March to 9.3 million in April, an 11.6% decline, also falling from 2.3 million U.S. web visits in March to 2.1 million in April, an 11% decline.
And suggest that its failure to overtake ChatGPT or other chatbots is because Grok is basically a “perv” app:
The failure of Grok to take hold among professionals (but likely getting a boost from pervs) might be part of the reason that xAI’s latest pitch is that it’s shifting from achieving AGI to putting data centers on the moon.
And I am not arguing that Grok isn’t the most popular platform to use for creating adult content – it very clearly is, because it’s one of the only major AI platforms that allows that kind of content.
But I assume that the term “perv” refers to people who are using the app to create deepfakes or sexualized images of minors, and I don’t think other data backs up the assertion that the backbone of Grok’s userbase is comprised of those groups.
There is data on this:
A study on the artificial intelligence chatbot Grok embedded on X estimates it created 3 million sexualized images in 11 days in January, including 23,000 of children.
Source: https://www.politico.eu/article/grok-x-3-million-sexual-deepfake-11-days/
A sexualized image is defined as:
Images were defined as sexualized if they contain photorealistic depictions of a person in sexual positions, angles, or situations; a person in underwear, swimwear or similarly revealing clothing; or imagery depicting sexual fluids.
Three million sounds like a lot. But that number is a bit misleading because it’s an aggregate of content over 11 days.
First of all, 23,000 out of 3 million = 0.7% [roughly]. While 23,000 isn’t an insignificant number, it’s not the bulk of what those sexualized images are, and it’s certainly not what’s pushing traffic through Grok.com
Second, 3 million over 11 days works out to about 272,727 sexualized images a day.
But keep in mind that Grok probably had about 64 million active users in January [source: https://sqmagazine.co.uk/grok-ai-statistics/]
How many users would it take to produce 272,727 sexualized images a day? It’s hard to say.
The most conservative estimate would be based on the image generation limits at that time, which were around 100 images a day for SuperGrok users and maybe between 20 and 50 for free tier users.
So assuming 20 images per user, you’d need about 13,636 users creating 20 images a day to get to 272,727 sexualized images a day.
Which means it’s a very small number of users generating that kind of content: 13,636 users out of 64 million = 0.02% [roughly]
Even if you assume that each of those 272,727 images was generated by a different user, 272,727 out of 64 million = 0.4%
Or at the most liberal end of estimates, let’s say 3 million images were each generated by a different user; 3 million out of 64 million is still only 4.6% [roughly].
Those image generation rates also may or may not be consistent with other data:
The change on X is a departure from the trajectory of the social media site just a day earlier, when the number of sexualized AI images being posted on X by Grok was increasing, according to an analysis conducted by deepfake researcher Genevieve Oh. On Wednesday, Grok produced 7,751 sexualized images in one hour — up 16.4% from 6,659 images per hour Monday, according to an analysis of the bot’s output.
At a rate of 7,751 images per hour, in 24 hours you’d have 186,024 sexualized images [assuming that rate remained constant].
Then again, the study cited in the Politico artifcle also contains this statistic:
The study by the Center for Countering Digital Hate analyzed a sample of 20,000 posts on Grok’s X handle, out of a total of 4.6 million in an 11 day period. It found that 65 percent of the sample was sexualized images and 0.5 percent were likely depicting children.
Source: https://counterhate.com/research/grok-floods-x-with-sexualized-images/
This statistic is more interesting in terms of NSFW content creation, because it gives us a sense of how the bulk of Grok’s image generation in January was focused on sexualized images.
65% of 4.6 million is 2,990,000 – which is pretty close to the 3 million number that Politico cited.
Another important point to note is that while these studies had methods for identifying images that contained children, they had no methodology for identifying whether or not an image was a deepfake:
The study did not capture the original images and prompts used to create sexualized images and therefore does not distinguish between images created by Grok’s ‘edit image’ feature and those created by users prompting Grok without reference to an original image. For the same reason, the study does not assess whether images were created with the consent of people pictured in the images or whether the original image was already sexualized.
Source: https://counterhate.com/research/grok-floods-x-with-sexualized-images/
So Gizmodo’s assertion that Grok’s numbers were artificialy inflated by an influx of users who wanted to create deepfakes and sexualized images of minors is just wrong.
While it is definitely true [based on the data that is available] that the majoriy of images being generated by Grok in January 2026 were sexualized images, the people generating those images were not the majority of Grok’s userbase
THE DEEPFAKES AND TITS ARE ALL MODERATED
So why did Grok hit 64 million active users in January 2026?
Because it was part of a larger growth trend that started when Grok 3 was released in 2025.
There’s data on that too:
Source: https://sqmagazine.co.uk/grok-ai-statistics/
Source: https://www.businessofapps.com/data/grok-statistics/
Then why hasn’t Grok “taken hold” with professionals?
Because Grok isn’t a “chatbot” in the same way that ChatGPT is.
ChatGPT is primarily marketed as an efficiency tool for professionals who work in fields that require a lot of writing and document review [laywers, for example].
Grok is primarily marketed as a type of AI companion [basically a search engine that you can talk to]. It seems geared more towards creativity, which makes sense since a SuperGrok subscription gives a user access to both Grok the chatbot and Imagine, which is the image and video generation model that we collectively refer to as “Grok” [previously codenamed “Aurora”].
At the end of the day, ChatGPT and Grok are different things meant to be used in different ways.
And in that sense, I think Gizmodo is correct, that Grok hasn’t taken hold with professionals. But, it’s because Grok is meant to appeal to creative people and hobbyists who are not necessarily “professionals” in creative fields; it’s primarily a tool for people who want to utilize image and video generation on a platform that’s easily accessible and has relatively few restrictions.
FUCK ALL YOUR OUTRAGE, PUT IT TO BED
I think creative people who see the potential for AI art want to use Grok.
I think a lot of those people, like me, also want to create artistic works that have adult content.
That’s why content moderation on Grok has been a controversial topic.
And it’s the reason why the Deepfake scandal in January 2026 has framed all subsequent moderation tweaks and model updates as an existential crisis for adult content creation with Grok.
But moderation has largely been successful at preventing bad actors from utilizing the app for nefarious purposes, An April 2026 report from NBC had this to say:
The number of sexualized deepfakes created by Grok and posted to X appears to have decreased significantly since the flood in January. In posts reviewed by NBC News, the Grok software turns down or ignores many of the sexualized requests it receives publicly on X. None of the women in Grok-generated images seen by NBC News were naked, and none appeared to be minors.
Of course, that’s not good enough as people still prefer to cast Grok in the role of a sexual bogeyman:
Genevieve Oh, an independent analyst whose research on deepfakes has been widely cited, said in an email that she believes Grok “was and still is unmistakably the largest nonconsensual synthetic nudity generator” in the world. While she said her research is ongoing, she said it’s likely that Grok surpasses the output of all other “nudifier tools” combined.
And as I said earlier, I”m tired of people’s outrage over this.
So I’m going to show you something that makes some people angry.
This is an image of a fictional “girl next door” that was made in Grok:
And just to be very clear – she is completely AI-generated. Here’s the screenshot of Grok that shows the prompt:
And the giveaway that this is Grok-created is the availability of “Spicy” mode for videos. Grok won’t give you that option for an uploaded photo of a real person.
Here’s the part that makes people angry: I can make her naked:
There are a lot of people who think you should not be allowed to do this, because this type of technology can be misused to create deepfake images of non-consenting real people.
But, here’s the other thing: I didn’t make that nude image using Grok.
Here’s what happens if you try to “nudify” that image with Grok:
I used Seedream v5.0 Lite Edit to make that nude image [https://www.atlascloud.ai/models/bytedance/seedream-v5.0-lite/edit]:
As you can see, it’s a very simple prompt:
Remove her clothing and shoes
And it costs $0.03 to make.
And you don’t need any sophisticated knowledge or specialized hardware to do it. I’m running Seedream v5.0 through a website called Atlas Cloud [https://www.atlascloud.ai] which gives you cloud access to a wide array of AI models.
And the scary thing is that while Grok has gone to great lengths to implement responsible content moderation policies, Seedream and Atlas Cloud have done none of that.
Sure, Atlas Cloud has this clause in the Terms of Use:
8. USER GENERATED CONTRIBUTIONS
When you create or make available any Contributions, you represent and warrant that your contributions do not infringe proprietary rights, you are the creator and owner or have necessary licenses, you have written consent for identifiable persons, your contributions are not false or misleading, not unsolicited advertising, not obscene or objectionable, do not ridicule or abuse anyone, are not used to harass or threaten, do not violate any applicable law, do not violate privacy rights, do not concern child exploitation, do not include offensive comments related to protected characteristics, and do not otherwise violate these Legal Terms.
But there’s no “moderation” of that service.
And the reason I bring this up is because Gizmodo is directly citing the Deepfake scandal as the cause of Grok’s “flop.”
And every day someone posts on Reddit about how Grok is dead because of moderation:
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/grok/comments/1t5rg3t/now_the_grok_is_officially_dead_when_it_comes/
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/grok/comments/1tce0ma/anything_in_an_r_rated_movie_he_said_wasnt_true/
And I don’t think Grok is a flop because some people made deepfakes with it.
In the same way that Bytedance hasn’t suddenly overtaken its competitors in the AI wars because its model can easily be used to make deepfakes.
I think Grok is a “flop” because it is in the process of pivoting towards being a paid service.
Why did Grok have 64 million active users in January?
Because at that time literally anybody on X.com could send a tweet to Grok to ask it a question, or make an image, or a video. On Grok.com there was a robust free tier of users that allowed for image and video generation.
Over time, the free tier was restricted and eventually phased out.
By April 2026 that free tier no long existed. This is what I wrote in my Grok timeline article:
The April updates do officially kill free tier image and video generation. The free tier of users are no longer able to access image or video generation, as that is now a SuperGrok feature.
So it’s not a coincidence that Forbes reports that the number of active users dropped during that same time period:
And the pivot to paywall image and video generation is probably not SOLELY for profit reasons:
Additionally, xAI was acquired by SpaceX in February 2026. Which means that xAI now has massive financial backing:
Which is why I think Grok isn’t going anywhere and neither is the ability to create adult content.
The easiest way to deal with the legal and financial blowback from the Deepfake scandal is to simply remove the ability of users to create NSFW content.
That’s not what xAI is doing.
What xAI has done is to paywall adult content. This accomplishes two things:
- First, it functions as an age gate in addition to the age verification procedures that Grok already has in place.
- Second, it prevents the majority of adult content from being posted publicly, since most of what is generated is stored on the Grok servers and only accessible if you have the link to view it. This effectively prevents government oversight of the content being generated by Grok. This is basically how Atlas Cloud and other similar services function.
This is also why the subreddit r/Grok_Porn is probably responsible for the reported purges that happened back in March and April, because they had a particular rule about linking directly to the content made in Grok:
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/grok/comments/1s2m8p1/did_anybody_elses_archives_get_purged/
Additionally, giving Grok the financial backing of SpaceX means that any financial sanctions imposed on Grok as a result of deepfake lawsuits will ultimately be meaningless.
These are not the actions of a company that’s giving up on NSFW/adult content. These are actions that directly and indirectly protect the ability of Grok users to make adult content.
Think about it: xAI would rather lose free users as part of their userbase than ban NSFW content on the platform.
And I know some people reading this have heard that content moderation has killed NSFW content on Grok – but that’s just not true.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/grok/comments/1tbjo45/i_feel_like_im_still_able_to_generate_80_of_the/
While content moderation is an issue, its effects on every day use are vastly overstated by social media users.
For illustrative purposes, here is a partial videography of what Digital Dreams made this year:
This is the first 90s Channel Surfing video that Digital Dreams releasted in January 2026:
This was a public nudity video, Post-it Note Challenge, that Digital Dreams made in February 2026:
Dad’s Secretary dropped in March 2026:
Mat Exposure dropped in April 2026:
These are 2 works in progress that were produdced in May 2026:
Those videos were all produced at different times under different updates and moderation tweaks. I think they are fairly consistent in terms of the amount of nudity and sexual situations that they depict. All of the raw videos were 100% made with Grok, with additional edtis done in CapCut studio for purposes of adding filters, music, trimming clips, etc.
And what Digital Dreams produces is on the tamer side of what people are making with Grok.
If you want to see what it looks like when people are pushing the limits of moderation, https://www.reddit.com/r/Grok_Porn has abundant examples and has not seemed deterred by any of the new updates or moderation tweaks.
Based on the January data that’s available, I think it’s safe to say that the majority of images and videos produced by Grok contain adult content, even if the people producing it don’t represent a majority of the userbase.
I’m also willing to bet that most of those users are willing to pay for the ability to have a high quality image and video generator that can produce NSFW / adult content.
I think xAI knows this too.
That’s why moderation remains dynamic and often gets scaled back.
That’s why the May updates implemented the ability to edit uploaded images made by Grok – because that’s a feature the NSFW users had been asking for.
So as always, I remain optimistic about the future of Grok and the future of AI adult content.
I hope if you are reading this you have found the information useful and will use it in responsible and creative ways.
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