TikTok, the app we all know and love, was banned for U.S. users on Jan. 19 after the Supreme Court upheld the law banning the platform. After years of speculation and congressional back and forth, the Chinese owned social media app voluntarily shut down for 14 hours due to bipartisan efforts concerning national security.
TikTok has been one of the leading social media platforms since its founding in 2018. The app’s over 170 million U.S. based users have found community through dance challenges, viral videos and discourse. These communities took years to form and have flourished with every added user. There’s something for everyone on TikTok. Leading up to Jan. 19, users weren’t sure where they would go for their daily entertainment in the event of a TikTok shutdown.
Right now, there are three main platforms poised to be TikTok’s replacement: Instagram, TikTok affiliate Lemon8, and Chinese-owned RedNote (Xiaohongshu). All three of these platforms are similar to TikTok, but they just don’t have the same feel.
Many TikTok creators are beginning to post videos redirecting their followers to their Instagram, Lemon8 and RedNote accounts, but are people actually moving? My answer is yes and no.
Instagram Reels is an interface similar to TikTok, and most people already have a profile and can make the easy switch. But there’s a catch — many Instagram users do not utilize reels. The special algorithm TikTok uses is top tier. TikTok knows what you want to see and how you want to see it because of users’ years of liking, commenting and favoriting videos. Because Reels are built into the mainly picture focused app, their usage is subpar. It would take me months to build up my Reels feed to the same quality that TikTok already has, and personally I don’t want to put in that work.
As far as new options go, Lemon8 is a failure. Lemon8 is owned and operated by ByteDance which is the same company that created and currently owns TikTok. I assumed because the apps are so interconnected that the platforms would be nearly identical. I was wrong.
Lemon8 is more like Pinterest than its sister app. It allows you to click on videos from different tabs like “makeup” and “travel” but there is no scrolling. You have to click in and out of different videos to see them which is a hassle compared to the ease of TikTok and Reels. One thing that is great about Lemon8 is that you can connect it to your TikTok account so your followers and following transfer, but that is still only if the person you follow has a Lemon8 account.
RedNote, on the other hand, is extremely similar to TikTok. RedNote has a “Trending” page which is exactly like TikTok’s “For You” page. The user experience is almost identical for U.S. users — if you’ve used TikTok, it will be very easy to use — except that the app is mainly in Mandarin. This poses a problem when interacting with other users on the app, but if people do begin using RedNote as a true second coming of TikTok, I think the app could begin catering to an American audience.
As far as where you should and shouldn’t go for your 15 second fix, I’d say that Instagram Reels and RedNote are the better options for a doom scroll. There will be no true replacement for TikTok, but as time passes, people will find new apps to be obsessed with and become a part of their daily routine.