Serial entrepreneur Elon Musk just welcomed his eleventh child with musician Grimes. Details about his kids, and baby mamas explored.
South African-born American entrepreneur Elon Musk is a business magnate and investor.
Musk is the founder, chairman, CEO and chief technology officer of SpaceX; angel investor, CEO, product architect and former chairman of Tesla, Inc.
Also, he is the co-founder of tunneling startup Boring Company and recently added social media platform, X, formerly called Twitter.
As the co-founder and CEO of Tesla, Elon leads all product design, engineering and global manufacturing of the company’s electric vehicles, battery products and solar energy products. Since the company’s inception in 2003, Tesla’s mission has been to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy.
Elon Musk is also known for his growing family. In 2020 and 2022, Elon quietly welcomed children with alternative musician Grimes. The names of their children have sparked internet debate.
So, how many kids does Elon Musk have? Although the public thought they knew the answer, it turns out they didn’t. Read on to find out everything you need to know about Elon’s growing family.
How many children does Elon Musk have?
Elon Musk doesn’t only have numerous companies and a heavy fortune, but he also keeps his family on growing.
Within two decades, the Tesla founder has become a father of 11 children with three women.
The names of his children are Nevada Alexander, Vivian Jenna Wilson and Griffin, Kai, Saxon and Damian, X Æ A-12, Strider and Azure, Exa Dark Sideræl, and Techno Mechanicus.
Elon shares all of his kids with three women. The names of the mothers of his children are Justine Wilson, Grimes, Shivon Zilis.
His first child was born in 2002 and his most recent in 2023.
The first six children he shares with his ex-wife, Canadian author Justine Wilson. After first meeting as students at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, the SpaceX CEO wed Wilson in 2000 — but after seven years of marriage and five kids, the couple officially divorced in 2008.
Two years later, the entrepreneur married and divorced actress Talulah Riley twice — the first lasting from 2010 to 2012, and the second from 2013 to 2016. They never had children together.
In 2018, Musk and singer-songwriter Grimes (whose real name is Claire Boucher) were linked — and had their first child together in 2020.
Despite splitting up in September 2021 after three years, Grimes revealed in a March 2022 Vanity Fair interview that the couple had reconciled and welcomed another child via surrogate in December 2021. At the time, she also revealed that the couple wants more babies — telling the outlet, “we’ve always wanted at least three or four” — but the day the article was released, she tweeted that they had broken up again.
A few weeks prior to the arrival of their second child together, the CEO secretly fathered twins with Shivon Zilis in November 2021, according to court documents published by Insider. The twins were born in Austin, Texas.
In September 2023, a biography about Musk revealed that he and Grimes had secretly welcomed a third child. They named their second son Techno Mechanicus, who also goes by “Tau.”
During an interview with The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council, Musk spoke about his children’s futures. He shared that he has no plans to “automatically” “if they have no interest or inclination or ability to manage” his empire.
Who are Elon Musk’s children and what does their names mean?
Nevada Alexander
SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES
Nevada Alexander, born in 2002, is Elon Musk’s first child. He shares with his former and first spouse, Justine Wilson.
Elon was married to Canadian author Justine Wilson from 2000 to 2008.
Tragically, Nevada died as a result of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) at just 10 weeks old.
“Nevada went down for a nap, placed on his back as always, and stopped breathing,” Wilson wrote in a 2010 essay for Marie Claire. “By the time the paramedics resuscitated him, he had been deprived of oxygen for so long that he was brain-dead.”
She continued, “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.”
Vivian Jenna Wilson and Griffin
Following the death of their first child, Elon Musk and Justine Wilson decided to go through IVF to grow their family.
Vivian Jenna Wilson and Griffin is the former couple’s twins who was born in 2004.
One of Musk’s now 18-year-old twins has filed to legally change her name and gender and said she no longer wishes to be related to her father, according to court documents.
The April 18 petition seeks the legal change of her name to Vivian Jenna Wilson (the maiden name of her mother, Justine Wilson); recognition of her gender as female; and the issuance of a new birth certificate to reflect the changes.
“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,” Vivian wrote in the petition explaining her request for the changes.
In an October 2022 interview with Financial Times, Musk said he believes Vivian doesn’t want to be associated with him because of the supposed 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,” said the Tesla CEO. “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
Kai, Saxon and Damian, born in 2006, are the next triplets between Elon and Canadian author Justine Musk.
She revealed in a 2017 TedTalk that they were also conceived via IVF, but she and Musk have not discussed the children themselves publicly.
Musk does not often discuss his own family, but he does have strong opinions on increasing the birth rate — stating that there are “not enough people” in the world at Wall Street Journal‘s annual CEO Council in December 2021.
“I think one of the biggest risks to civilization is the low birth rate and the rapidly declining birthrate,” he said. “Please look at the numbers – if people don’t have more children, civilization is going to crumble, mark my words.”
Their birth following up with the couple’s separation. Justine and Elon divorced in 2008.
X Æ A-12
X Æ A-12 is the first child between Elon Musk and musician Grimes. They welcomed him on May 4, 2020.
Their son X Æ A-12, whose name was later changed to X Æ A-Xii, was in part named after the CIA’s Lockheed A-12 reconnaissance plane.
Though nicknamed “X,” Grimes broke down his pronunciation in her Instagram comment section. “It’s just X, like the letter X,” she wrote. “Then A.I.,” she added. “Like how you said the letter A then I.”
But Musk explained the pronunciation differently, saying on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast that “X” is spoken “like the letter” while “the ‘Æ’ is pronounced like ‘ash.'”
While proudly stating that “A-12 was [his] contribution,” he said it was Grimes who “mostly came up with the name.” She even gave a thorough description of the meaning behind it on her Twitter.
Strider and Azure
Strider and Azure are Elon’s twins he secretly had with Neuralink executive Shivon Zilis.
The twins were born in November 2021, in Austin, Texas — just weeks before he and Grimes welcomed a baby girl Exa, via a surrogate.
The parents revealed the babies’ names and sexes in September 2023, when they were 16 months old.
While Strider is a boy, Azure is a girl.
SOURCE: TWITTER/@SHIVONZILIS
A report from Insider revealed that Neuralink director of operations and special projects Shivon Zilis and Elon filed to change their children’s legal surnames to Musk earlier in 2022. The petition asks that the children “have their father’s last name and contain their mother’s last name as part of their middle name.”
CNN Business also discovered a document from Travis County, Texas, showing the petition was filed in April 2022 and obtained in May. The company Neuralink was co-founded by Musk and is developing implantable brain chips to improve cognitive function.
Neither parent has commented on the news, although Elon seemed to hint at it in a tweet from July 7, 2022: “Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis. A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.”
Exa Dark Sideræl
SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES
Exa Dark Sideræl is the second child between Musk and Grimes. He has 10 siblings and is the 9th of them.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, Grimes revealed that she welcomed a baby girl via surrogate in December 2021, three months after the couple’s public breakup. Named Exa Dark Sideræl, the singer-songwriter explained that her name has double meaning.
Exa Dark Sideræl was born in December 2021.
Exa refers to a supercomputing term, exaFLOPS, while Dark represents “the unknown.” She explained to the outlet, “People fear it but truly it’s the absence of photons. Dark matter is the beautiful mystery of our universe.”
The third part of Y’s full name, Sideræl, is pronounced “sigh-deer-ee-el,” according to Vanity Fair. Grimes described the word as “a more elven” spelling of sidereal, which she defined as “the true time of the universe, star time, deep space time, not our relative earth time.”
The second meaning of Sideræl is a nod to Grimes’ favorite Lord of the Rings character, Galadriel, who “chooses to abdicate the ring.”
In March 2023, Grimes shared a rare photo of her daughter on Twitter — and revealed that the little girl is going by a new name.
“Normally we [don’t] post her for her privacy, but she’s fairly unrecognizable here since shes channeling Goku,” the mom-of-two wrote in the comments, referring to a Dragon Ball character. The photo showed Musk’s youngest in a red onesie with super blonde spiked hair.
In a separate comment, Grimes said: “She’s Y now, or “Why?” or just “?” (But the government won’t recognize that). curiosity, the eternal question, .. and such.”
In August, Grimes described her younger child as “a little engineer,” and said, “she likes industrial shipping. She’s very strange.”
Techno Mechanicus
SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES
Techno Mechanicus aka “Tau” is Elon Musk’s “new” secret baby and his overall 11th child with musician Grimes.
Elon confirmed that he and Grimes actually have another child together. Fans only found out because pop culture update account, Pop Base, leaked the information. Elon replied and confirmed his child’s existence.
Keeping in trend with the other odd names of his kids, this child is named Tau Techno Mechanicus.
Also the billionaire’s youngest child’s existence was confirmed in journalist Walter Isaacson’s biography about Musk. It revealed the birth of the Tesla founder’s third child with Grimes.