Apple gets yanked into Elon Musk’s chatbot war with OpenAI

Elon Musk has reignited tensions with Apple, accusing the tech giant of manipulating App Store rankings to favor OpenAI's ChatGPT over his own AI project, Grok. In a series of posts on X, Musk claimed that Apple's actions constitute an antitrust violation, suggesting that it has become increasingly difficult for any AI firm outside of OpenAI to achieve the top position in the App Store. "Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store," Musk asserted, although he did not provide any supporting evidence for his claims. He also threatened legal action against Apple, stating that xAI would pursue immediate recourse. Musk's frustration seems to stem from a partnership between Apple and OpenAI announced last year, which saw the integration of ChatGPT into Apple's iPhone, iPad, and Mac operating systems. This collaboration has led Musk to believe that Apple is giving ChatGPT an unfair advantage in the app rankings. At present, ChatGPT occupies the top position in the 'Top Free Apps' category for iPhones in the US, according to Reuters, with Grok in fifth place and Google's Gemini chatbot significantly lower at 57th. Data from Sensor Tower also reflects ChatGPT's dominance in the Google Play Store. Despite Musk's claims that ChatGPT's lead is artificially maintained, fact-checkers on X noted that other AI applications have previously surpassed ChatGPT in the rankings. For instance, DeepSeek was able to claim the top spot in January, holding it for several days, as reported by ABC News. While OpenAI has yet to respond to Musk's allegations, one of its developers, Steven Heidel, cheekily remarked in response to Musk's posts, suggesting that Musk should also hold Google and SimilarWeb accountable for ChatGPT's prominence on Android and its ranking among the most-visited websites, respectively.