‘The funniest turn of events ever’: China’s RedNote tops the Apple App Store as the TikTok ban looms

American TikTok fanatics are migrating over to another Chinese short-form social media platform ahead of next week’s potential TikTok ban.

Xiaohongshu, which translates to “little red book” but is being called RedNote, shot up to become the most-downloaded app on the Apple’s U.S. App Store on Monday.

The app, which has 300 million monthly active users, is similar to Pinterest with a mix of Instagram and TikTok. It also boasts several social shopping features.

Xiaohongshu launched in 2013 and is flush with investor attention. It’s raised roughly $917 million in venture funding and is reportedly valued at $17 billion. But the American attention has come on suddenly, especially considering they’ve really done no outreach to the U.S. market. Users have to switch the language over from Mandarin to English in the settings.

TikTok is now being flooded with content from users who are posting their experiences on Xiaohongshu. A large part of the user interest amounts to general pettiness: The government takes a highly addictive app away due to its host country’s national security threats, users just find another one from said host country.

“It’s actually the funniest turn of events ever,” one TikTok user posted in the comments of a video.

“I made my username my social security number just so my red note guy would get promoted faster,” a user joked in the comments on another TikTok, referencing the meme that Chinese spies curated users’ highly specific TikTok feeds.

The future of TikTok is, for now, still undecided. The Supreme Court is expected to rule by the end of this week whether or not the app can continue operating in the U.S. unless it divests from its parent company or is sold to an approved buyer.

Right now, it’s set to be banned in the U.S. on January 19, and all signs point to the Supreme Court upholding the ban.

TikTok would likely be removed from app stores immediately, so that companies like Apple and Google don’t have to pay hefty fines. This doesn’t mean that the app will disappear from American users’ devices. But the app’s quality would eventually degrade or TikTok could pull users from having access to videos on the platform.

President Donald Trump could also try to thwart the ban’s implementation once he takes office on January 20, but it’s unclear whether those efforts would actually work.

https://www.fastcompany.com/91259825/rednote-tops-apple-app-store-as-tiktok-ban-looms?partner=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss