Elon Musk is widening access to X Money, the payment system built into X, and the move shows he is still serious about turning the social network into something closer to a one-stop app. According to Bloomberg, more US users can now try the service, with the company using the early rollout to collect feedback before a broader launch.
The pitch is familiar by now: send money, pay for goods and services, and keep more of your financial life inside X. That is the same ambition Musk has long attached to the platform, borrowing from the ”super app” model popular in China. Ambition is cheap, of course; making payments feel trustworthy is the expensive part.
How X Money is being tested
Dhruv Batura, who leads X Money, said the company wants first users to surface rough edges before the service scales up. That suggests X is treating the rollout less like a splashy launch and more like a controlled stress test, which is probably the sensible way to do payments when mistakes are measured in trust rather than just bugs.
The timing is also telling. Public tests were supposed to begin in April, but even before that, selected US users had already been granted access, with perks such as 3% cashback on chosen purchases and 6% yield on account balances in X Money. Those incentives are a classic hook: get people in the door first, then hope the product is sticky enough to keep them there.
What Musk is trying to build inside X
Musk’s advantage is obvious. He helped build PayPal, so the payments idea is not coming from nowhere. Still, X is trying to do something harder than launching another wallet app: it wants to fold transfers, shopping, and everyday spending into the same place where people already scroll, post, and argue.
- More US users now have access to X Money
- Early testers are being used to find problems before a wider launch
- Selected users previously saw 3% cashback and 6% yield on balances
The catch is that payments businesses do not win on vision alone. They win when people trust the plumbing, the fees, the support, and the boring little details that make or break daily use. If X Money keeps expanding, the real question is whether Musk can persuade users to treat X as a place to transact, not just to talk.