Elon Musk drops Apple from antitrust suit, targets OpenAI instead

Elon Musk spent the better part of two years calling Apple’s ChatGPT integration “creepy spyware” and warning the world about a smartphone-AI monopoly. Now he’s apparently decided Apple isn’t the villain of this particular story after all.

On September 14, xAI and X Corp. voluntarily dismissed their antitrust claims against Apple in a Texas federal court, leaving OpenAI as the sole remaining defendant in a lawsuit that once painted both companies as co-conspirators bent on cornering the AI chatbot market.

From spyware accusations to a quiet exit

The legal saga traces back to June 2024, when Apple first announced it would weave ChatGPT into iOS features including Siri. By August 2025, the rhetoric had hardened into an actual lawsuit. X Corp. and xAI filed suit alleging that the Apple-OpenAI partnership handed OpenAI access to 80% of the chatbot market share, effectively locking out competitors like Musk’s own Grok chatbot. The complaint argued this arrangement harmed competition in both the smartphone and generative AI markets.

Apple and OpenAI both tried to get the case tossed. They failed. In November 2025, US District Judge Mark Pittman denied their motions to dismiss, allowing the suit to proceed. Apple maintained throughout that its partnership with OpenAI was never exclusive.

Judge Pittman sanctioned the voluntary dismissal without releasing any public details about whether a settlement was reached or what motivated the decision.

OpenAI remains in the crosshairs

With Apple out of the picture, the lawsuit narrows to a single target: OpenAI and its alleged monopoly in the chatbot sector. OpenAI has characterized Musk’s legal campaigns as harassment. This isn’t the first time Musk has dragged OpenAI into court. An earlier, separate lawsuit against the AI company was dismissed in May 2026 due to a statute-of-limitations issue.

What the Apple dismissal signals

Dropping Apple from the suit is a strategic pivot. By narrowing the case to OpenAI alone, Musk’s legal team avoids the complexity of arguing that one of the world’s most valuable companies conspired to harm competition in a market it doesn’t directly compete in. Apple makes phones and operating systems. OpenAI makes chatbots. Focusing exclusively on OpenAI lets the plaintiffs build a cleaner narrative: that one company, through aggressive partnership strategies and market positioning, has cornered the generative AI chatbot space at the expense of rivals.

For Apple, the dismissal removes a meaningful legal overhang. The company can continue expanding its AI partnerships without the cloud of an active antitrust case suggesting those deals are inherently anti-competitive.

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