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Grimes and Elon Musk Had a Secret Third Child: All About the Controversial Billionaire's Many Kids
Elon Musk is the founder, CEO and chief engineer of SpaceX; the CEO of Tesla, Inc.; the owner and former CEO of Twitter (now "X"); the co-founder of Neuralink and OpenAI; and the father of 11—that's right, 11—children. Here is everything we know about the billionaire's brood.
How many kids does Elon Musk have?
Elon Musk is the father of 11 children. Sadly, his first child, son Nevada Alexander Musk, died at just 10 weeks old as a result of SIDS, in 2002. The rest of his kids range in age from under a year to 19 years old.
Who are the mothers of Elon Musk's kids?
Elon Musk has 11 children (one of whom died in infancy) with three different women. They are:
Justine Wilson
Musk's first six children were with his first wife, Canadian author Justine Wilson, to whom he was married from 2000 to 2008. Wilson has been candid about the marriage, stating, "I was a starter wife" as part of a revealing essay in Marie Claire.
Related: A Potentially Thorny Documentary Investigating Elon Musk Is on Its Way From an Oscar Winner
Grimes
Musk shares three children with his former romantic partner, singer Grimes, who gave birth to their son X Æ A-Xii in May 2020. They then welcomed a daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl, via surrogate in December 2021. Their third child, Techno Mechanicus, nicknamed Tau, was kept private until author Walter Isaacson referred to Grimes as "the mother of three of Musk’s children" in his new book about the billionaire, Elon Musk.
Grimes, whose real name is Claire Elise Boucher, is a Canadian musician, singer, songwriter and record producer.
Shivon Zilis
In November 2021, between the birth of his first two children with Grimes, Musk welcomed a set of twins with employee Shivon Zilis, the Neuralink director of operations and special projects.
Who are Elon Musk's kids?
Nevada Alexander Musk
Musk’s firstborn son, Nevada Alexander Musk, was born in 2002. Tragically, young Nevada passed away from SIDS at only 10 weeks old. Nevada’s mother, author Justine Wilson, wrote about the heartbreaking loss in an essay for Marie Claire in 2010.
“Nevada went down for a nap, placed on his back as always, and stopped breathing. By the time the paramedics resuscitated him, he had been deprived of oxygen for so long that he was brain dead. He spent three days on life support in a hospital in Orange County before we made the decision to take him off it. I held him in my arms when he died."
Musk has remained mostly silent (at least in public) about the loss of his son. However, in an email expressing his sympathy to a father who lost his 18-year-old son in a Tesla crash in 2018, he wrote, “There is nothing worse than losing a child. My firstborn son died in my arms. I felt his heartbeat.”
Griffin Musk
Following the devastating loss of their first child, Musk and his then-wife Justine Wilson used IVF to have more children. As a result, Griffin and his twin Vivian were born in April 2004. The twins are now 19.
Wilson wrote about her journey with IVF, which was complicated by her grief over Nevada’s tragic loss. “I buried my feelings ... coping with Nevada's death by making my first visit to an IVF clinic less than two months later. Elon and I planned to get pregnant again as swiftly as possible.”
Vivian Jenna Wilson
Vivian Jenna Wilson was born alongside her twin, Griffin, in April 2004. In 2022, at age 18, she filed to legally change her name and gender, seeking recognition of her gender as female and the issuance of a new birth certificate reflecting both of these changes. She sought to change her last name to that of her mother’s, leaving behind her father’s surname.
In the petition, Vivian explained her reasoning, including her desire to drop her father’s last name, writing, “Gender Identity and the fact that I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form."
Musk has given his own explanation for why he believes Vivian has fallen out with him, attributing the takeover of elite schools and universities by neo-Marxists. "It's full-on communism...and a general sentiment that if you're rich, you're evil. It [the relationship] may change, but I have very good relationships with all the others [children]. Can't win them all."
Kai, Saxon and Damian Musk
Musk’s then-wife Canadian author Justine Wilson gave birth to triplet sons Kai, Saxon and Damian Musk in January 2006. The triplets turned 17 this year. Both Wilson and Elon have declined to speak publicly about the triplets at any great length, though Wilson did confirm the trio was also conceived via IVF in a 2017 TedTalk.
Musk and Wilson divorced in 2008. In a 2010 op-ed for Business Insider, he wrote that he paid his ex $20,000 a month in child support in addition to Wilson’s living expenses and the salaries of the children’s nannies.
He explained, “Custody of our five children is split evenly. Almost all of my non-work waking hours are spent with my [children], and they are the love of my life.”
After founding the school Ad Astra in 2014, Musk pulled his children from private school and enrolled them there. Ad Astra, meaning “to the stars” in Latin, began at the SpaceX campus with just 50 students before transitioning to an online school called Astra Nova. The school does not have a grading system and offers courses in artificial intelligence, applied science and coding.
However, in a 2021 interview on the Clubhouse app, Musk has admitted that the majority of his children’s education may have come from another source.
“Well, my observation is my kids were mostly educated by YouTube and Reddit, and then you know, and their—I guess—classmates. And I guess there were lessons as well, but judging by the amount of time they spent online, it seemed like most of their education is actually coming from online.”
X Æ A-Xii (originally X Æ A-12)
Elon Musk and singer Grimes welcomed their first child together on May 4, 2020. Their son was initially called X Æ A-12, but his name was later changed to X Æ A-Xii.
Grimes explained the name on X (the app), writing,
“•X, the unknown variable ⚔️
•Æ, my elven spelling of Ai (love &/or Artificial intelligence)
•A-12 = precursor to SR-17 (our favorite aircraft). No weapons, no defenses, just speed. Great in battle, but non-violent 🤍
+
(A=Archangel, my favorite song)
(⚔️🐁 metal rat).”
The singer revealed her pregnancy in January 2020 with a photo of her baby bump.
Azure and Strider
Musk and Neuralink director of operations and special projects Shivon Zilis welcomed twins in November 2021, around the same time he and Grimes welcomed a daughter via surrogate.
Exa Dark Sideræl Musk
Just a month after welcoming a set of twins with Shivon Zilis, Elon Musk and Grimes welcomed a daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, born via surrogate, in December 2021. The parents nicknamed the child “Y” due to her brother having the moniker “X.”
Techno Mechanicus (aka Tau)
The birth of Musk's third child with Grimes, Techno, was only recently revealed in Walter Isaacson's biography. Shortly after the news became widespread, Grimes confirmed it herself on X. "I wish I could show u how cute little Techno is but my priority rn is keeping my babies out of the public eye," she wrote.
Why did Grimes accuse Elon Musk of not letting her see their son?
In September 2023, after Walter Isaacson, author of a new Musk biography, posted the first photos of Musk's twins with Shivon Zilis, Grimes responded somewhat shockingly, suggesting that Musk is not letting her see one of their sons (although she didn't make clear which son she was referring to).
"Tell Shivon to unblock me and tell Elon to let me see my son or plz respond to my lawyer. I have never even been allowed to see a photo of these children until this moment, despite the situation utterly ripping my family apart," she wrote in the since deleted tweet.
She subsequently apologized for the comment. "As u can imagine, that was a very gut-level reaction to a thing that has been very hard for me," she wrote. "Communication about the twins wasn't handled super well in the past, but I now totally understand what happened and totally forgive the situation."
She went on to explain that she and Zilis have talked and are now on good terms. "Women are so often pitted against each other. Speaking with Shivon, it's very evident she's an amazing human and we both just want what's best for our kids."
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Why does Elon Musk have so many kids?
Elon Musk has been very vocal about the reasoning behind his large number of offspring. He tweeted in July 2022, “Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis. A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.”
He expressed the same sentiments in December 2021 at The Wall Street Journal's annual CEO Council, where he said there are “not enough people.”
He continued, “I think one of the biggest risks to civilization is the low birth rate and the rapidly declining birthrate. Please look at the numbers—if people don't have more children, civilization is going to crumble, mark my words."
Related: From Tesla to Twitter, What We Know About Elon Musk's Net Worth In 2023
How do you say Elon Musk's kids' names?
The pronunciation for the majority of Elon Musk’s children’s names are pretty self-explanatory. However, we would understand if you need some help with how to say the names of his children with singer Grimes, X Æ A-Xii and Exa Dark Sideræl Musk.