X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, adopted its current logo in July 2023 when owner Elon Musk abruptly retired the company’s iconic blue bird mark. The new identity consists of a white X glyph on a black background, which appeared on the platform’s web version on July 24, 2023, replacing the bird that had been in use since 2012.[1][2]
Musk, who acquired the platform for $44 billion in late 2022, announced the change in a post on July 23, 2023, saying the company would soon “bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.”[2] The transition reflects Musk’s vision to turn the platform into what he has called an “everything app,” combining audio, video, messaging, and payments.[2]
Design and History
The X logo was not commissioned from a design agency. Instead, Musk invited users to submit logo proposals, writing that if “a good enough X logo is posted tonight, we’ll make [it] go live worldwide tomorrow.”[3] The winning submission came from Twitter user Sawyer Merritt, co-founder of the sustainable lifestyle apparel brand Twin Birch. Merritt offered a symbol originally designed for his now-discontinued podcast about Musk’s ventures, called X Pod, and credited Alex Tourville as the designer.[3] Merritt created a slimmed-down version of the logo for the launch video, “adding a glow and little lines in the logo to make it look ‘imperfect’.”[3]
Musk described the chosen design as “minimalist art deco,” adding that it would “certainly be refined.”[4] Graphic designers quickly recognized the mark as closely resembling the Unicode character “Mathematical Double-Struck Capital X” (U+1D54F), a symbol intended for use in mathematical equations that first appeared in Unicode version 3.1 in 2001.[5] Tourville stated he based the design on a Unicode character, while Merritt said the thicker original version was “inspired by a font [Tourville] found online.”[5][3]
Monotype, the typeface company, confirmed to The Verge that the X logo does not match the capital or lowercase X glyph from its “Special Alphabets 4” font, despite visual similarities noted by online observers.[5] The Unicode Consortium stated that characters submitted to the Unicode Standard are released under a free and open-source license that allows anyone to use them without restriction, including in a trademark or company logo.[5]
The logo rolled out in phases. It first appeared on the desktop version of the site on July 24, 2023, while the bird remained dominant across the mobile app.[4] The mobile app icon changed to the X logo later that week, on the night of July 28, 2023.[2] Musk also posted a picture of the design projected on Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters, and a large illuminated X sign was later installed on the building’s roof, prompting an investigation by city officials over whether it was installed without proper approval.[4][2]
In August 2023, X released an official brand toolkit with black and white variants of the logo, along with logo and handle lockup files for partners and brands.[6]
Meaning and Symbolism
Musk has long been fascinated with the letter X. It appears across his ventures, including SpaceX, the artificial intelligence company xAI, and X Corp., the entity that now owns the platform.[2] In 1999, he founded a startup called X.com, an online financial services company that later became PayPal.[4] The X.com domain now redirects users to the platform.[4]
Musk’s stated intention for the rebrand was to position X as an “everything app” similar to China’s WeChat, combining video chats, messaging, streaming, and payments.[4] Linda Yaccarino, the CEO Musk tapped in May 2023, wrote that X would be “the future state of unlimited interactivity, centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking, creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities.”[4]
Typography and Design
The X logo functions as a standalone symbol mark without a wordmark. Its design closely resembles the Unicode mathematical double-struck capital X character (U+1D54F), which is what allowed Musk to post the logo in text-based tweets.[5] The mark consists of one chunky, angular stroke crossing over a thinner one.[5]
In late 2024, observers noted that the X logo had been quietly refined to correct an optical illusion. Designer Will Paterson had pointed out that the Poggendorff illusion caused the top-right stroke of the X to appear misaligned with its lower portion. A year later, the logo was adjusted, moving part of the X upward to fix the perceived imbalance.[7]
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