Elon Musk's latest change to X is the most contentious one yet
Elon Musk's latest change to X is the most contentious one yet
Your X feed could look completely different soon, as Elon Musk appears to be favoring a more minimalist design
👀 X could get another major redesign soon
👋 The like, repost, and comment buttons could be removed for a cleaner look and feel
👉 Users will be able to interact with posts with gestures like swiping left or right
🤷♂️ Musk said he thinks the change is “awesome” but the vast majority of users disagree
Big changes could be coming to X in the coming months ahead, including a dramatic redesign of how the app looks and functions.
The social media platform will soon discard the like and repost buttons on the timeline, moving to a gesture-based approach instead. Users can swipe left to like a post and swipe right to reply. They can also Force Touch to see a menu with more actions.
The move would represent a seismic change in how the app functions, with only the view count remaining in the top-right corner. The video below shows how X will look with the comment, repost, like, and share buttons removed.
Elon Musk seems keen on the new look, saying, “It’s awesome. Just swipe left to like and right to reply.” However, there has been a lot of pushback from users who feel like it could hurt the overall experience.
One user said that they “hate this with the fire of a thousand suns”, but Elon said that he would be open to reverting the change if it isn’t well-received. From what I can tell, the overwhelming reaction to the new X design is firmly against removing the like, repost, and comment buttons.
A poll by one user with 3,785 votes as of writing shows only 6.7% want the change, while 93.3% do not. But that’s unlikely to deter Elon Musk who has a habit of making changes regardless of initial public feedback.
And he might be right in pushing through. Many of the changes Musk has made to X, formerly known as Twitter, have paid off. It hasn’t always been the smoothest, nor without controversy, but the app appears to be in good health despite the countless doomsday predictions that were made during Musk’s initial takeover and ownership.
X could also bring back the downvote button, which made a brief appearance in 2022 before being removed. The reason why a downvote button might be introduced was explained by X employee Jay Baxter, who said: “Community Notes wouldn’t work well without negative rating signal. But you have to be smart about how you use them. If you naively add them all up, you’ll get a hivemind like Reddit. One way: only downrank if you see negative ratings from people who typically disagree.”
Again, not every feature that’s suggested or leaked makes its way to X, but removing the likes or repost buttons would arguably be one of the biggest changes to the social media platform to date.
Up next: Likes on X are now private – here’s why
Adam Vjestica is The Shortcut’s Senior Editor. Formerly TechRadar’s Gaming Hardware Editor, Adam has also worked at Nintendo of Europe as a Content Marketing Editor, where he helped launch the Nintendo Switch. Follow him on X @ItsMrProducts.