Apple on Tuesday responded to Elon Musk’s claims that the App Store favors OpenAI’s ChatGPT app. A company spokesperson told Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman that the App Store is “fair and free of bias.”
The App Store is designed to be fair and free of bias. We feature thousands of apps through charts, algorithmic recommendations, and curated lists selected by experts using objective criteria. Our goal is to offer safe discovery for users and valuable opportunities for developers, collaborating with many to increase app visibility in rapidly evolving categories.
On Monday, Musk threatened to sue Apple, claiming that the Cupertino device maker violates antitrust regulations by favoring OpenAI’s ChatGPT in App Store rankings over his Grok AI assistant.
“Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation. xAI will take immediate legal action,” Musk said in a post on X (Twitter), which he also owns.
Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation.
xAI will take immediate legal action.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2025
Musk didn’t provide any evidence to support his claim, while other X users pointed out that DeepSeek reached #1 overall on the App Store in January, long after Apple’s partnership with OpenAI was announced.
Musk also criticized Apple for not featuring X or Grok in the App Store’s “Must Have” section. At the time of this writing, ChatGPT holds the top spot for free apps, while Grok ranks sixth. Google’s Gemini chatbot sits at 57th.
Meanwhile, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman fired back with his own X post.
This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn't like. https://t.co/HlgzO4c2iC
— Sam Altman (@sama) August 12, 2025
Musk’s threats come amid growing pressure on Apple from regulators and competitors around the globe over its App Store practices.
