Elon Musk is a very busy man. He started SpaceX, Tesla, and owns a company called X which used to be Twitter. He also helped create Neuralink and OpenAI. He’s also a dad to 11 kids. That’s a lot! Let’s find out more about his big family.
How many kids does Elon Musk have?
Elon Musk has 11 kids. His first child, Nevada Alexander Musk, passed away when he was only 10 weeks old because of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) in 2002. The other children are between less than a year old and 19 years old.
Who are the mothers of Elon Musk’s kids?
Elon Musk has 11 kids. Sadly, one of them passed away when they were very young. He has three children with three different women. Here are their names:
Justine Wilson
Elon Musk had his first six kids with his first wife, a writer named Justine Wilson. They were married from 2000 to 2008. Justine has openly talked about their marriage, saying, “I was his first wife” in a personal essay for Marie Claire.
Grimes
Elon Musk has three kids with his past girlfriend, singer Grimes. They had a son named X Æ A-Xii in May 2020. Later, in December 2021, they welcomed a daughter named Exa Dark Sideræl with the help of a surrogate. They also have a third child named Techno Mechanicus, but they kept this one private until author Walter Isaacson mentioned Grimes as “the mother of three of Musk’s children” in his recent book about Elon Musk.
Grimes, whose actual name is Claire Elise Boucher, is a musician, singer, and producer from Canada. She writes and creates music.
Shivon Zilis
In November 2021, while he was having his first two kids with Grimes, Musk also had twins with his employee Shivon Zilis. She works at Neuralink and oversees operations and special projects.
Who are Elon Musk’s kids?
Nevada Alexander Musk
Elon Musk’s oldest child, Nevada Alexander Musk, was born in 2002. Sadly, little Nevada died from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) when he was only 10 weeks old. Nevada’s mom, writer Justine Wilson, shared the very sad story in a Marie Claire article in 2010.
When Nevada was put down for a nap, he was placed on his back as usual, but he suddenly stopped breathing. When the paramedics managed to revive him, he had gone without oxygen for so long that he suffered brain damage. He spent three days on life support in an Orange County hospital before we decided to let him go. I held him in my arms when he passed away.”
Musk has mostly kept quiet about losing his son, at least in public. However, in an email to a father who lost his 18-year-old son in a Tesla accident in 2018, he wrote, “Losing a child is the most painful thing. My first son passed away in my arms. I felt his heartbeat
Griffin Musk
After the very sad loss of their first child, Musk and his then-wife Justine Wilson turned to IVF (In Vitro Fertilization) to have more kids. This led to the birth of Griffin and his twin sister Vivian in April 2004. The twins are 19 years old now.
Wilson shared her experience with IVF, mentioning how it was made harder by the pain of losing Nevada. She mentioned, “I kept my emotions inside… and soon after Nevada’s passing, less than two months later, Elon and I decided to try IVF. We wanted to have another baby as soon as we could.”
Vivian Jenna Wilson
Vivian Jenna Wilson was born with her twin brother Griffin in April 2004. When she turned 18 in 2022, she applied to officially change her name and gender. She wanted her identity as a female to be recognized, and she requested a new birth certificate to show these changes. Vivian also wished to take her mother’s last name, choosing not to keep her father’s surname.
In her request, Vivian explained her decision, saying, “My Gender Identity and the fact that I no longer live with or want any connection with my biological father in any way.
Musk has shared his thoughts on why he thinks Vivian has distanced herself from him. He believes it’s because of what he sees as the influence of neo-Marxist ideas in top schools and universities. He describes this as a strong belief in communism and a general feeling that being wealthy is bad. He acknowledges that the situation might change, but he maintains good connections with his other children. He understands that you can’t always have everything go your way.
Kai, Saxon and Damian Musk
Elon Musk’s then-wife, Canadian writer Justine Wilson, had three sons named Kai, Saxon, and Damian in January 2006. The triplets are now 17 years old. Both Wilson and Elon have chosen not to discuss the triplets publicly in much detail. However, Wilson confirmed in a 2017 TedTalk that the triplets were also conceived through IVF.
Musk and Wilson got divorced in 2008. In a 2010 article for Business Insider, Musk mentioned that he provided his ex-wife with $20,000 each month for child support, along with covering her living expenses and paying for the children’s nannies.
He said, “I share custody of our five kids. I devote most of my free time to them, and they mean the world to me.”
In 2014, Musk started a school called Ad Astra. He took his kids out of their private school and enrolled them there. Ad Astra, which means “to the stars” in Latin, started at the SpaceX location with only 50 students. Later, it became an online school that doesn’t give traditional grades. Instead, it focuses on teaching subjects like artificial intelligence, practical science, and coding.
Musk openly mentioned in a 2021 Clubhouse app interview that a large part of his children’s learning likely came from sources like YouTube and Reddit. He explained, “To be honest, it seems like my kids learned a lot from the internet and their peers. Of course, there were also formal lessons, but considering how much time they spent online, it seemed like a big part of their education came from the internet.
X Æ A-Xii (originally X Æ A-12)
Elon Musk and singer Grimes had their first child on May 4, 2020. At first, they named him X Æ A-12, but later they changed it 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
In November 2021, Elon Musk and Shivon Zilis, who works at Neuralink, had twins. Around the same time, Musk and Grimes also had a daughter through a surrogate.
Exa Dark Sideræl Musk
In December 2021, just a month after having twins with Shivon Zilis, Elon Musk and Grimes welcomed their daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl Musk. She was born with the help of a surrogate. The parents affectionately called her “Y” because her brother was named “X.”
Techno Mechanicus (aka Tau)
Walter Isaacson’s biography recently uncovered the arrival of Musk’s third child with Grimes, named Techno. Grimes confirmed this on X, saying, “I really want to share how adorable little Techno is, but right now, my main focus is keeping my babies away from the public.
Why did Grimes accuse Elon Musk of not letting her see their son?
In September 2023, after Walter Isaacson, the writer of a recent biography about Musk, shared the first pictures of Musk’s twins with Shivon Zilis, Grimes reacted quite surprisingly. She hinted that Musk isn’t allowing her to see one of their sons, though she didn’t specify which one. In a tweet that has been removed, she said, “Ask Shivon to unblock me and tell Elon to allow me to visit my son or please reply to my lawyer. I haven’t even been shown a picture of these kids until now, even though this situation has caused a lot of pain for my family.”
Later, she said sorry for her earlier comment, acknowledging it was a strong emotional reaction to something that had been really tough for her. She admitted there had been some difficulties in communicating about the twins before, but she now comprehends the situation and forgives it entirely.
She also shared that she’s spoken with Zilis and they’re in good terms now. She emphasized the importance of women supporting one another and mentioned that after talking to Shivon, she realized they both want what’s best for their children.
Why does Elon Musk have so many kids?
Elon Musk has openly talked about why he has many children. In a tweet from July 2022, he said, “I’m trying my best to address the issue of not enough people. A declining birth rate is the most serious threat civilization is facing.”
He shared similar thoughts in December 2021 during a meeting with The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council. He mentioned that there are simply not enough people.
He went on to say, “I believe one of the major threats to society is the very low and rapidly falling birth rate. Just take a look at the statistics—if people don’t have more kids, our way of life is in serious jeopardy, believe me.”
How do you say Elon Musk’s kids’ names?
Most of Elon Musk’s children have names that are easy to say. However, you might need some guidance with the names of his children with singer Grimes, X Æ A-Xii and Exa Dark Sideræl Musk.
Both Grimes and Elon have offered different ways to pronounce X Æ A-Xii, who they call “X.”
Grimes said it’s simply “X,” like the letter, then “A.I.” as in saying the letter A followed by I.
Elon clarified that “X” is like the letter, and the ‘Æ’ is pronounced like ‘ash.’
They agree that calling him “X” is probably the easiest choice!
Grimes gave her daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, a name with special meanings. “Exa” refers to a term in supercomputing, exaFLOPS, while “Dark” stands for “the unknown,” representing the absence of light. Grimes sees dark matter as a fascinating mystery in the universe.
Vanity Fair explained that the third part of her name, “Sideræl,” is pronounced as “sigh-deer-ee-el.” Grimes mentioned it’s a more fanciful spelling of “sidereal,” which denotes the true time of the universe, star time, beyond our Earth’s perspective. It’s also a tribute to Grimes’ beloved character from Lord of the Rings, who decided to let go of the ring.
Grimes and Elon playfully call their daughter “Y” in reference to their son’s nickname, “X.”
Grimes explained in a tweet from March 2023, along with a rare photo of the child, that they refer to her as “Y” which represents curiosity and the eternal question. She added, “But the government won’t accept that as an official name.
SOURCE: PARADE