Elon Musk's xAI has launched Grok Imagine, an image and video generation tool, via its iOS app for all SuperGrok and Premium+ X subscribers. Maintaining Musk's signature approach to AI development, the tool positions itself as an unfiltered AI platform capable of generating explicit content including adult material.
The AI system transforms text or image prompts into 15-second native-audio videos with its "Spicy Mode" feature. While explicit content generation is possible, our experimental testing showed limitations - certain adult-oriented prompts resulted in blurred/redacted outputs. However, semi-nude imagery could still be successfully generated through the system.
Given xAI's previous release of a vulgarized AI-generated anime companion last month, this explicit content functionality isn't surprising. Yet this unregulated nature that initially attracted users to Grok - before sparking issues with hate speech and gender-related content - may lead to unintended consequences with the video generation capabilities of Grok Imagine.
CNBC first reported the Spicy Mode functionality through a now-deleted social media post by xAI employee Mati Roy: "Grok Imagine videos include a Spicy Mode that can generate nudity content."
Current restrictions provide some reassurance, particularly regarding celebrity content generation from Trump to Taylor Swift. TechCrunch's attempt to create an image of Trump in a pregnancy scenario failed, with the system only generating images of Trump holding infants or standing beside pregnant women.
While still in early development stages targeting competition with Google DeepMind, OpenAI, Runway, and Chinese rivals, Grok Imagine's human figure rendering remains in the uncanny valley phase. Generated characters exhibit waxy skin textures and sometimes cartoon-like features in the video output.
Despite these technical limitations, the generator demonstrates impressive capabilities by auto-generating new images during scroll from text prompts, then animating them into stylized videos through an intuitive interface.
Musk announced on social media that the AI model "improves daily," signaling ongoing development efforts for the platform.