X owner Elon Musk has suggested users may have to pay for use of the platform in a future update.

Elon Musk this week met with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu for a live-streamed interview on X. During the conversation, Musk said "we're moving to having a small monthly payment for use of the system.”

It was not immediately clear whether it was merely an ‘off-the-cuff’ remark or an allusion to as yet unannounced plans for the platform – something which has become routine for Musk's erratic ownership of the social media platform.

Earlier this year, Musk said the value of X now stood at a “$20 billion ”, which is less than half of what the billionaire paid for the platform, then known as Twitter, back in 2022.

In efforts to shore up the company’s finances, Musk introduced a paid subscription tier for public figures to verify their identities which was previously free or charge. This worsened an already prevalent issue of fraudulent accounts on the platform, with pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly seeing its share price plummet after an impersonator joked that the company was going to make insulin free for Americans.

X later made a U-turn on this plan and reinstated blue verification badges free of charge for celebrities with over one million followers, while more recently adding a requirement for Verified subscribers to submit government issued ID to prove their identity.

Musk, who has spent the past year cosying up to far right political figures such as Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, was also asked by Netanyahu during the conversation to 'roll back' the level of antisemitism on X.

When Musk took over the platform, there was a mass exodus of large advertisers such as General Motors when Musk reinstated accounts of controversial figures including former president Donald Trump, Andrew Tate, and a wide range of far right and openly Nazi accounts.

Musk himself has openly engaged in antisemitism on the platform, repeatedly accusing the George Soros – whose net worth stands at a fraction of Musk's – of wanting to "destroy western civilisation" and saying that he "hates humanity". Soros, a successful Jewish businessman, philanthropist, and holocaust survivor, has become a target of the far right, with baseless accusations levied against him widely serving as a dog whistle for antisemitism.

Netanyahu, a controversial figure himself for a continued campaign of Palestinian ethnic cleansing, told Musk during the livestream: “I know your commitment to free speech, but I also know your opposition to antisemitism. You’ve spoken about it, tweeted about it. And all I can say is, I hope you find, within the confines of the First Amendment, the ability to stop not only antisemitism, or roll it back as best you can, but any collective hatred of people…. I know you’re committed to that and I hope you succeed. And it’s not an easy task, but I encourage you and urge you to find a balance.”

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