X is significantly opening up the systems behind its For You feed and introducing a new tool that can show users whether the platform has applied labels that may be limiting the visibility of their accounts or posts.
The company has published a much larger portion of its recommendation algorithm on GitHub under the Apache 2.0 open-source license. The newly released codebase is roughly 10 to 15 times larger than X’s previous public version.
X is also rolling out a new transparency feature called Under the Hood.
Users who have posted at least 10 times during the previous month will be able to download a report showing aggregate information about labels applied to their account or posts during the previous calendar month.
These labels can affect whether content appears normally in the For You feed or has its visibility restricted. This effectively gives users a way to investigate whether X’s systems have been reducing their reach, something often described as “shadowbanning.”
The report comes as a JSON file, a structured data file normally meant for computers. X says less technical users can give the file to an AI chatbot alongside the company’s public algorithm code and ask it to explain what the data means.
The feature is initially being tested with selected accounts that are at least one year old before X expands access further.
The newly published code provides significantly more detail about how X selects, filters, and ranks posts.
It includes the core ranking system, model configuration, filters, and the weightings used to calculate how likely a user is to interact with a post. Developers can even run parts of the Phoenix ranking system themselves outside X.
X has not published everything. Some systems, including specific prompts and rules used to detect potentially problematic content, remain private because the company says releasing them could help spammers and other users bypass its protections.
The project goes beyond simply allowing people to inspect the code.
Developers can submit pull requests, which are proposed changes to the software, through GitHub. X engineers may review those submissions and potentially incorporate useful changes into the platform’s algorithm.
X VP of Product Keith Coleman said the company’s goal is for the public to be able to examine how posts are distributed, determine whether the system provides a level playing field, and criticize areas they believe should be improved.
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