TikTok at one billion users

Short-form social video platform TikTok has surpassed one billion users, parent company ByteDance has announced.

Usage of the app exploded during the Covid-19 pandemic, with TikTok being the most-downloaded app in the world during the first quarter of 2020. The company ended 2020 with revenues of US$34.3 billion – more than double a year prior – while ByteDance was valued at US$425 billion in July.

Announcing the milestone on TikTok, the company’s chief operating officer Vanessa Pappas said: “Over one billion people from around the world come to TIkTok to be entertained, inspired or discover something new like sports, music, arts and culture, fashion, DIY and more.”

Elsewhere, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has spoken publicly on previous plans to acquire TikTok after the Trump administration launched a campaign against the app in mid-2020s. The government threatened to block the app in the country unless ByteDance divested its US assets to an American company. 

Speaking at the Code Conference, Nadella said that the proposal was the “strangest thing I’ve ever sort of worked on” and that “it is an interesting product.” 

Ultimately the threats proved to be hollow, and a deal agreed with Oracle was not signed before president Biden revoked Trump’s order earlier this year.