Social: Due to lack of post visibility, X is dying
Ahhhh – this just in on June 1, 2026 – X is being turned into TikTok, and The Algorithm will reward video content featuring attractive young people.
The platform’s strategy now favors entertainment, politics, and emotional clickbait over dry, factual analysis. Content that does not fit this “entertainment” bucket—such as objective economic data—is systematically deprioritized in favor of content that keeps users in a passive, scrolling state or provokes heated debate.
The Academic and Expert Exodus
As of early 2026, the majority of UK academic institutions have ceased posting on X, citing the platform’s shift away from respectful, informative discourse and the rise of Grok-driven toxicity. Many experts note that the platform is no longer viable for sharing research or data-driven insights because the algorithm actively suppresses content that doesn’t generate “viral” engagement metrics. The “shadowbanning” of nuanced topics means that even with a large follower count, visibility can drop to 1-2% if the content is deemed too “boring” or “niche” by the engagement-based ranking system.
“The algorithm does highlight content from smaller accounts, but largely prioritizes those with X Premium. This means small creators can still go viral and grow valuable audiences, but they generally need to be verified subscribers to signal ‘credibility’ to the ranking AI.
Before we dive further into the details, it’s important to recognize that:
You train the AI: Your specific interactions (bookmarks, video watch time) train the Grok AI to place you in specific ‘SimClusters,’ which tweaks your feed more effectively than manual settings.”
The algorithm is pay-centric: Organic reach for non-premium accounts is significantly lower.
How the Twitter Algorithm Works in 2026 [+6 Strategies] | Sprout Social
If your goal is to provide accurate, sourced information – then your posts are downranked because you link to the official source of the data:
The Twitter (X) algorithm favors certain types of content over others, especially anything with rich media like GIFs, images, videos or polls. Posts with visual content generally drive more engagement, which is why they get a higher score in the ranking system.
While rich media is favored, there is a major caveat: The algorithm penalizes external links. Elon Musk confirmed that posts containing links that take users off-platform often see a reach reduction of 50-90%. X wants to keep users on the app, so text-only posts or long-form articles generally perform better than posts with outbound links.
The Algorithm favors posts made between noon and 8 pm.
Basically, X favors “rich media” (videos, pictures, good looking people, etc), with no external links to off of X (such as what I was doing to provide factual data with cited references). The effect is that X is turning into TikTok garbage – indeed, X has said they want to be a “video first” platform.
- The trick to getting seen therefore is to
- Makes posts about the current topics du jour
- Make them video posts
- Do not link to anything offsite
- If your posts gets replies, respond to every reply within 2-3 hours.
I checked back on X this morning and misinformation and outright lies run rampant. X has become a frictionless platform for the spread of propaganda and misinformation. The quantity of lies is so large that it is impossible to respond – and if you do respond with actual facts and citations, your posts will be downgraded.
I have taken to Blocking (I used to just mute) accounts posting lies. The effect now is I Block more posts than I “like”, if I bother to use X anymore.