Panic over the US TikTok ban has boosted the use and downloads of several alternative social media apps, including Texas-based Clapper, the Chinese-owned RedNoteand Likee, a Little known platform Out of Singapore with an AI-powered video feed similar to TikTok, according to new market research.
People in Couldn’t access US TikTok For about 14 hours on Sunday after a federal law aimed at curbing China’s alleged influence on the app went into effect late Saturday night and triggered an unprecedented episode of internet censorship in a country that prizes free expression. . According to , about 63 percent of US teenagers and one-third of American adults use TikTok Pew Research Center.
Some of them took refuge in Like, a TikTok clone launched in 2017 by the profitable Singaporean tech company Joy. Like had about 33.9 million monthly users as of November, most of them outside the US. But on Saturday, Like had 143 percent more downloads and 37 percent more usage in the US than the previous day. Sensor towerwhich infers statistics by collecting data from a sample of devices. That trend continued into Sunday, when Like usage rose 11 percent from the day before.
Estimates from Apptopia, another company that studies the app industry, show that for months, Like recorded fewer than 10,000 downloads per day in the US before jumping to about 167,000 on Sunday and about 286,000 on Monday. Apptopia also predicted similar disruptions for TikTok competitors Clapper and Flip.
On Tuesday, shares of Joy, the parent company of Like, closed up nearly 3 percent, outpacing the average gain among its Nasdaq peers. happiness does not Break down Likee’s financials, but it and some of its sister apps generated about $73 million in sales from advertising and user purchases during the third quarter of last year. Like did not respond to a request for comment.
Other less frequent apps, including Clapper and Snap’s Snapchat, saw interest surge to double-digit gains in user activity over the weekend. TikTok’s biggest rivals, Meta’s Instagram and Facebook, saw more modest single-digit growth. YouTube and X, meanwhile, experienced little change in usage.
RedNote, another Chinese app that Americans had flock to According to Sensor Tower, 80 percent more users were added on Sunday than the day before, in protest during the days leading up to the ban. In the first two days of the rush earlier in the week, more than 700,000 new users joined RedNote, Reuters reported. Known as Xiaohongshu in Chinese, it has been ranked as the most downloaded free app on the Google and Apple App Stores in the US in recent days.
TikTok is back online In the US on Sunday, President-elect Donald Trump promised to temporarily ease the new law after taking office the next day. The law, signed by former President Biden last year, bans TikTok by threatening to fine web hosting providers and app stores that work with its parent company, Chinese tech company ByteDance, unless it in TikTok. Does not share its ownership. Sensor tower data shows that users returned to TikTok on Sunday, with daily active users up 17 percent from Saturday.
on Monday, Trump has issued an executive order Providing an additional 75 days to resolve the dispute on TikTok. But the legality of his decree remains in question, and TikTok is still not available in US app stores. But when users search for TikTok, they’re greeted by a list of options — like, Clapper, and more.
