(Credit: James Martin)
TikTok alternative RedNote has been experiencing explosive growth in the US, increasing from 300,000 active users to over 3 million in a week, according to internet traffic monitor Similarweb.
RedNote—also known as Xiaohongshu—has seen a surge of user activity as the US prepares to ban TikTok, Similarweb tells PCMag. RedNote’s daily active user count in the US reached 3.4 million on Monday, Jan. 13 as many TikTokkers began posting about moving to the TikTok rival.
(Credit: Similarweb)That 3.4 million number is remarkable since RedNote registered only 654,000 active users the day before and 407,000 users on Saturday.
During the same period, Lemon8—another TikTok alternative owned by ByteDance—also saw its active users in the US increase to 1.7 million users, up from 1.1 million a week earlier. Meanwhile, TikTok itself saw its active user count decrease by about 2.1% week-over-week.
The US migration to RedNote and Lemon8 is expected to increase, especially since the Supreme Court today upheld a US law meant to ban TikTok in the country, starting on Sunday, Jan. 19. That said, President-elect Donald Trump and some US lawmakers are looking for ways to delay the ban or render it toothless, despite previously supporting blocking TikTok in the past.
The TikTok ban was bundled into a larger foreign aid package signed by President Biden last year. He and members of Congress cited the threat of the Chinese government forcing the video-sharing app to secretly collect data on Americans and spread propaganda. But the real goal of the law is to pressure ByteDance to sell TikTok to a US buyer. ByteDance has refused to sell and reportedly plans to shut down the app in the US on Sunday.
Will RedNote and Lemon8 face similar bans? Their privacy policies suggest they collect a wide range of data from US users and share the information with third parties. So users should be careful before they consider migrating.