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With the United States ready to ban TikTok, millions of American users are racing to alternatives. The sudden spike in popularity of Chinese social media app RedNote-software, better known as Xiaohongshu in China-became quite prominent. According to data from analytics firm Similarweb, the number of daily active users for RedNote in the U.S. surged from less than 700,000 to about 3.4 million in one day.
The ban, effective January 19, 2025, is due to a concern about national security related to data privacy and ownership by the Chinese. The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act requires ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, to divest its U.S. operations or face a ban. With ByteDance saying publicly it does not plan to sell, and the Supreme Court silent on the issue so far, a ban seems sure to take place.
In turn, so-called “TikTok refugees” have signed up for other services to keep their social media presence alive. RedNote has emerged as one of the favored alternatives, as it surged up the download charts in the U.S. app stores. The migration helped shave 2.1% off TikTok’s usage to an estimated 82.2 million daily active users in the U.S.
Yet, such growth of users in the United States begets questions as to its future within the American market. With its Chinese ownership and in the current geopolitical climate, RedNote may come under similar scrutiny and possible restriction under U.S. laws on foreign-controlled applications. It is not clear how the application can stand up to the censorship and regulations within the U.S., and this may be dependent on how it faces these challenges.
With the deadline on January 19, the U.S. will see a turn of events that will be truly dramatic in the social media landscape. It underlines that digital platforms have always been dynamic and may be impacted due to geopolitical tension. Whether RedNote will sustain momentum in the light of probable regulatory hurdles remains to be seen in the evolving narrative of global social media.
