- The X Terms of Service at a glance
- What the Terms say about your content
- What you're not allowed to do on X
- New in the October 2026 Terms: AI features and agents
- When X can suspend or close your account
- Which court hears a dispute with X
- Your account security is your job
- My verdict
- Frequently asked questions
The Twitter (X) Terms of Service are the contract you accept by using X, and the current version took effect on 9 October 2026. In short: you must be at least 13, you keep ownership of your posts but give X a broad free licence to use them, including to train its AI models, you can't scrape X without written permission, and disputes outside the EU and UK go to courts in Texas.
Almost nobody reads the X TOS, which is a shame, because a few clauses affect every business account. Here's what the October 2026 version says in plain English, clause by clause, and what each part means for how you use X.
The X Terms of Service at a glance
| Clause | What the Terms say | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| Who can use X | You must be at least 13 | Under-13s can't have an account anywhere |
| Your posts | You own them but grant X a worldwide, royalty-free licence with the right to sublicense | X and its partners can show, adapt and share what you post |
| AI training | The licence covers training X's machine learning and AI models, generative or otherwise | Public posts can feed X's AI |
| Scraping | Crawling or scraping in any form without prior written consent is prohibited | Bots and scrapers break the contract |
| Usernames | X can reclaim usernames, including for prolonged inactivity | An abandoned handle can be taken back |
| Liability | Outside the EU, EFTA States and UK, capped at the greater of $100 or what you paid X in the past six months | Your claims against X are small by design |
| Disputes | Texas courts outside the EU, EFTA States and UK; Irish courts inside them | Where you live decides the court |
The dollar figures here come straight from the US version of the Terms as of October 2026. The European and UK version sets the scraping damages in euros instead, and rather than a fixed cap it limits X's liability as far as the law of your country allows.
What the Terms say about your content
The Terms put it bluntly: what's yours is yours. You own the posts, photos, audio and video you share. But by posting, you give X a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence, with the right to sublicense, to use, copy, adapt, publish and distribute that content in any media, for any purpose.
Two parts of that licence are worth knowing about:
- AI training. The licence includes letting X analyse your text and use it for training its machine learning and artificial intelligence models.
- Sharing with other companies. X can make your content available to other companies, organisations and individuals, for example for syndication and broadcast, with no payment to you.
You also promise you have the rights to whatever you post. If you share someone else's photo or video without permission, that's on you, not X.
What you're not allowed to do on X
The misuse section is longer than most people expect. Among other things, the Terms ban you from:
- Accessing or searching X by any means other than X's published interfaces, unless you have a separate agreement with X.
- Crawling or scraping X in any form, for any purpose, without prior written consent.
- Trying to get around X's safety or security controls, including through jailbreaking, prompt engineering or prompt injection.
- Probing or testing the vulnerability of X's systems, outside X's official vulnerability reporting programme.
- Sending altered, deceptive or false source-identifying information.
The scraping clause has teeth. If you request, view or access more than 1,000,000 posts in any 24-hour period in breach of the Terms, X says you're liable for liquidated damages of $15,000 per 1,000,000 posts, and anyone who knowingly helps can be jointly liable.
New in the October 2026 Terms: AI features and agents
The 2026 wording reflects how people now use AI on X. You're responsible for your use of features that perform autonomous actions, and for your inputs, prompts and outputs, not just the posts you type yourself. If an AI feature acts on your behalf, the Terms treat its actions as yours to answer for.
When X can suspend or close your account
X can suspend or terminate an account if it reasonably believes you've broken the Terms or its Rules, you create risk or legal exposure for X, the account involves unlawful conduct, the account has been inactive for a long time, or serving you is no longer commercially viable. Where the law allows, X also reserves the right to end your account for any reason or no reason.
Short of a ban, X can also limit how widely your posts are distributed or seen. If your reach has dropped off a cliff, my guide to why an X account looks shadowbanned explains what to check.
Which court hears a dispute with X
| Where you live | Who your contract is with | Where disputes go |
|---|---|---|
| Outside the EU, EFTA States and UK, including the US | X Corp., Austin, Texas | Federal or state courts in Wichita County or Tarrant County, Texas, under Texas law |
| EU, EFTA States or UK | X Internet Unlimited Company, Dublin | A competent court in Ireland, under Irish law |
For the first group, the Terms also include a class action and jury trial waiver where the law permits, and binding arbitration in Tarrant County if the court clause is ever ruled unenforceable. UK users can challenge removals and suspensions through X's complaints process under the Online Safety Act 2023, and EU users can use X's process or out-of-court dispute settlement under the Digital Services Act.
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Posting someone else's work is covered separately in X copyright rules.
Your account security is your job
The Terms say you're responsible for safeguarding your account, and they spell out how: use a strong password, don't reuse it, and turn on two-factor authentication with an authenticator app or a security key. X says it won't be liable for losses if you don't. My X two-factor authentication guide walks you through it.
Usernames get the same hard-nosed treatment. X can reclaim a handle without liability, which is worth remembering before you pay anyone for a rare one through X's Handle Marketplace.
My verdict
The X Terms of Service favour X, as most platform contracts do, but there are no hidden traps if you post your own content, keep your account active and leave scraping tools alone. The two clauses I'd want every business owner to know are the AI training licence, so you think twice before posting anything you wouldn't want reused, and the Texas court clause, so you know where a dispute would land. X keeps the current version at x.com/tos and says it'll try to notify you of material changes.
The scraping ban has its own page, so see X's scraping rules.
Related guides live in the Twitter (X) Help: 21 Guides to Features, Verification, Video Fixes and Tools.
Frequently asked questions
When did the current X Terms of Service take effect?
The current version of X's Terms of Service took effect on 9 October 2026. X keeps the latest version at x.com/tos.
Does X own what I post?
No. X's Terms say you keep ownership of your content, but you give X a worldwide, royalty-free licence to use, adapt and share it, including for training its AI models.
Is scraping X against the Terms of Service?
Yes. The Terms prohibit crawling or scraping X in any form without prior written consent, and set liquidated damages for accessing more than 1,000,000 posts in 24 hours.
How old do you have to be to use X?
X's Terms of Service say you must be at least 13 years old to use X, wherever you live.
