X Restricts Likes and Follows on Free API to Fight Abuse

X is tightening its developer API rules. Effective immediately for free-plan developers, the platform is disabling two common actions: programmatic likes and programmatic follows. The stated goal is straightforward — reduce spam, bot-driven amplification, and manipulative engagement that harms user experience.

Developers on paid tiers — Basic, Pro, and Enterprise — are unaffected and retain access to those actions alongside higher rate limits and broader features. For free users, however, two of the most common programmatic interactions are now blocked, limiting common automation patterns used by bots and legitimate tools alike.

This policy follows a series of sweeping changes to X’s API under Elon Musk. The company initially ended free access with short notice, partially restored limited free usage, and then launched paid pricing in 2023 designed to monetize programmatic access. Prices and limits have already shifted — the basic tier price and quotas rose last October — and today’s action continues that trend toward stricter controls and monetization.

Why X made the change

X says the removal of likes and follows for free API users is intended to curb automated abuse, including spam and bot-driven manipulation. Those actions are high-impact: a few automated follows or likes can rapidly amplify content, distort discovery signals, and degrade trust in the platform.

The trade-off is clear. Restricting high-risk endpoints can reduce large-scale abuse, but it also constrains legitimate developers and small businesses that used the free API for benign automations such as social monitoring, lightweight bots, and workflow integrations.

Who this affects and how

Immediate winners include moderation teams and platform integrity engineers who get a narrower attack surface to police. Impacted parties include hobbyist developers, startups running lightweight integrations, social analytics tools that depended on programmatic likes/follows, and any workflow that relied on automating user engagement without paying for higher tiers.

For many legitimate teams, the choice will be pragmatic: accept reduced automation, pay for a higher tier, or re-architect solutions to work around the missing endpoints. That could increase costs, complicate compliance, or force product roadmaps to change.

• Audit current automations to find any reliance on likes or follows.
• If needed, run a cost comparison: pay for basic/pro vs rework with other integrations.
• Design safer automations that avoid high-impact actions or implement stricter rate controls server-side.
• Explore hybrid approaches: keep critical functions on paid tiers while running low-risk tooling on free quotas.

What organizations should do next

This is a moment to balance platform safety and operational needs. Product and engineering leads should map API dependencies, quantify the downstream impact of losing likes/follows, and prioritize replacements or paid-subscription decisions. Legal and compliance teams should also review terms of service and data handling as access patterns change.

For startups and third-party toolmakers, the change could be a tipping point. Some will accept higher bills to retain functionality. Others will pivot toward alternative features or platforms, or build new products that don't depend on programmatic engagement. The result will likely reshape parts of the X developer ecosystem over the coming months.

At QuarkyByte we view this as more than a pricing move — it’s a prompt to rethink how automation should behave on public social platforms. We help teams model usage patterns, estimate migration costs, and design safer automation that resists abuse while preserving legitimate business value. The right mix of analytics, architecture changes, and policy alignment can reduce risk without destroying functionality.

Bottom line: X’s restriction of likes and follows on the free API narrows the attack surface for bad actors, but it raises real operational questions for legitimate developers. Expect some short-term disruption, a likely uptick in paid subscriptions from enterprise users, and a period of adaptation as third-party tooling evolves to the new rules.