Some advertisers plan to pull back from Elon Musk’s X in 2025 over fears of ‘brand safety’

Elon Musk’s X is taking another hit as many advertisers plan to pull back their spending in the coming year.

The fear among advertisers is that there is a lack of “brand safety” on the platform, with some of the content posing a harm to brands’ image, according to a new report from Kantar, a marketing data and analytics firm. The report says that 26% of marketers around the world plan to decrease their X advertising spending in 2025.

Kantar conducted research on top platforms for advertisers, including X, based on surveys with 18,000 consumers from nearly 30 countries, as well as about 1,000 marketing professionals.

In the report, the firm noted that one brand is “distinctly not well-received by marketers”—that brand being X. A lowly 4% of marketers think X ads provide brand safety, compared to 39% who said the same of Google.

On top of this, overall trust for X ads among marketers has dropped from 22% to 12% since 2022. Similarly, 15% of marketers were favorable toward X ads in 2022, compared to 21% who are unfavorable today. Kantar notes that this decline in perception predates Musk’s purchase of Twitter in 2022, although his control of the platform has not improved matters.

Interestingly, because of the decline of ads on X, consumers appear to be enjoying the experience more. Kantar reports that “consumer ad preference” has greatly increased since 2022.

“Advertisers know that X now offers stronger brand safety, performance, and analytics capabilities than ever before, while seeing all-time-high levels of usage,” an X spokesperson told Fast Company. “Our brand safety rate is on average 99% as validated by DoubleVerify and Integral Ads Science, which is reflected by the fact that the majority of advertisers are increasing their investment in X, as shown by Kantar’s data.”