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LIST OF TWITTER CEOS & FOUNDERS
| CEO | Years | Tenure |
|---|---|---|
| Jack Dorsey | 2006–2008 | 2 yrs |
| Evan Williams | 2008–2010 | 2 yrs |
| Dick Costolo | 2010–2015 | 5 yrs |
| Jack Dorsey (2nd term) | 2015–2021 | 6 yrs |
| Parag Agrawal | 2021–2022 | 1 yr |
| Elon Musk | 2022–2023 | ~7 months |
| Linda Yaccarino | 2023–2025 | 2 yrs |
| Vacant (Musk-run) | 2025–present | 1 yr+ |
JACK DORSEY
Tenure: (2006–2008) & (2015–2021)
Jack Dorsey is an co-founded Twitter in 2006 with entrepreneurs Evan Williams, Biz Stone, and Noah Glass.
He’s most famous for sending the very first tweet: “just setting up my twttr.”
He also came up with the infamous 140-character format for all messages sent on the platform.
As a startup, Twitter was going through significant growing pains during his tenure.
There were frequent service outages and infighting.
Due to management issues, he was quickly replaced by Evan Williams.
EVAN WILLIAMS
Tenure: (2008–2010)
Evan Williams’s time as CEO was notorious for explosive growth—as Twitter went from 3 million to over 160 million users.
Although he was praised for the growing used base, internal conflicts continued to plague the inside of the company.
Williams was also under intense pressure from his investors to achieve profitability.
Eventually, he had to step down and was demoted to focus on product strategy because board members were concerned about his leadership style and decision-making abilities.
DICK COSTOLO
Tenure: (2010–2015)
Dick Costolo successfully led Twitter as its tech CEO through its IPO, where the young social platform when from a private company valued at $3.7 billion to $23 billion after it went public.
However, after the IPO, the company struggled to grow its user base.
The period was also filled with platform abuse issues and slow innovation.
JACK DORSEY (SECOND TERM)
Tenure: (2015–2021)
Realizing that Twitter needed to innovate, investors brought back Jack Dorsey for a second time as Twitter CEO.
Though he tried to innovate, the culture of the company was rotted from within.
Dorsey also had to deal with intense content moderation challenges, including the banning of President Trump.
User engagement was at a freefall after the 2020 election.
He eventually had to resign again due to political and investor scrutiny.
PARAG AGRAWAL
Tenure: (2021–2022)
Parag Agrawal had a very brief stint as the CEO of Twitter.
He quickly transitioned from his previous role as CTO following Jack Dorsey’s endorsement.
However, his reign of power ended abruptly when Elon Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion and immediately fired him.
Musk thought Agrawal was too mild-mannered for the role.
ELON MUSK
Tenure: (2022–2023)
Elon Musk was Twitter’s CEO for eight months after he bought the social platform for an eye watering $44 billion in October 2022.
He brought in dramatic changes:
- mass layoffs
- controversial platform modifications
- reinstatement of banned accounts
Under his leadership, Twitter’s value declined, major advertisers departed, and he is rebranding Twitter to “X.”
However, user engagement has skyrocketed since he became CEO, with innovations like blue check marks for all and other innovations in the pipeline.
LINDA YACCARINO
Tenure: (2023–2025)
Linda Yaccarino became Twitter’s (now X) CEO in June 2023,
She has been tasked primarily with rebuilding the platform’s advertising business while working under Elon Musk, who still maintains executive chairman and CTO roles.
She has been tasked with bringing back advertisers and implementing new initiatives like premium memberships and partnerships.
Her tenure was a challenging one.
With Musk’s unpredictable decisions and ongoing controversies around content moderation.
After two turbulent years, Yaccarino resigned on July 9, 2025—months after Musk folded X into his AI company, xAI.
THE POST-YACCARINO ERA (NO CEO)
Tenure: (2025–present, vacant)
X has operated without a CEO since Linda Yaccarino’s July 2025 departure.
Elon Musk’s xAI acquired the platform in an all-stock deal in March 2025 that valued X at $33 billion.
Since then, Musk has run X directly — first through xAI, and since February 2026 through SpaceX, which absorbed xAI ahead of its mega-IPO — with no permanent successor named.
As of July 2026, the corner office remains empty—and oddsmakers aren’t betting on that changing soon.
WHO IS THE CEO OF TWITTER (X) NOW?
X (formerly Twitter) has had no CEO since Linda Yaccarino resigned on July 9, 2025, after two years in the role. Elon Musk, whose xAI acquired X in March 2025 (both folded into SpaceX in February 2026), has run the platform directly ever since—and as of July 2026, the job remains unfilled.
