X Plans to Charge New Users an Annual Subscription Fee

Jakarta – X, formerly known as Twitter announced on Tuesday that the platform is testing out a subscription model in which it will charge new users $1 a year or equivalent IDR 16,000 to use basic features. 

The social media giant said it was launching its "Not a Bot" annual subscription method in New Zealand and the Philippines as a test run. Existing users will not be impacted during the test. 

"This will evaluate a potentially powerful measure to help us combat bots and spammers on X, while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount," X said, adding that the charge won't be a profit driver.

Users who create new accounts will verify their account with their phone number and then pay $1 USD. They will then be able to use key features like posting, liking, replying to, reposting, bookmarking and quoting posts. 

New users who opt out of the subscription will be relegated to "read only" functions, such as reading posts, watching videos and following accounts, according to X.