Why TikTok users are flocking to Chinese social media apps RedNote and Lemon8

Two social media apps have taken the first and second slots on the App Store’s top free apps list: Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote (the Chinese name translates to “little red book”), and Lemon8, which is owned by TikTok owner ByteDance. As the Supreme Court decides whether a so-called TikTok ban is constitutional — the deadline is Jan. 19, when the law that would ban the app is set to kick in — users are turning to other Chinese apps. Of course, those may not be available for long, either: The law, called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, wouldn’t only impact TikTok. Any app with ties to what the United States government designates as a foreign adversary, like China, could effectively be banned, including both RedNote and Lemon8, alongside other apps, like ByteDance’s video editing app CapCut.

Though some U.S. users posting on TikTok, RedNote, and Lemon8 are indeed looking to these apps as an alternative to TikTok, others are taking to the apps out of what Wired describes as “spite” — U.S. citizens can’t have TikTok because the government claims the Chinese company could share user data with the government? OK, we’ll move en masse to other Chinese social media apps, even if they could share the same fate.

What are RedNote and Lemon8?

RedNote and Lemon8 are two Chinese social media apps that U.S.-based TikTok users are encouraging each other to use ahead of the potential TikTok ban. Xiaohongshu is a private Chinese company that was valued at $17 billion in July, per CNBC. The app was created in 2013 as a “shopping guide for Chinese tourists,” but evolved into a social blogging and video app that brought in $1 billion in profit in 2024, according to Bloomberg.

Lemon8 is owned by a subsidiary of TikTok owner ByteDance. ByteDance started pushing TikTok users toward the app with sponsored TikTok posts as the TikTok ban looms, and has more than 1 million daily active users, according to Axios. 

Neither of these apps is a pure TikTok clone — they both host a combination of short-form blogging, video, and shopping. If you need a comparison, they’re mixtures of Instagram, Pinterest, and TikTok. Though there’s the obvious language barrier, both apps are pretty easy to use even if you can’t read Mandarin; anyone who’s been on TikTok can quickly pick up on the format. You can scroll endlessly through videos of cute animals, food, cozy gaming setups, and fit checks or chat in the comments section of short blog-like posts. (Currently, my front pages on both Lemon8 and RedNote show a lot of posts from both Chinese and U.S. users asking each other questions about all sorts of topics.)

Neither of these is to be confused with Douyin, which is ByteDance’s Chinese version of TikTok. That app is not available for download in the U.S. However, you can view Douyin in your browser.

Is TikTok really getting banned?

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments last week from TikTok owner ByteDance as the company looks to the court to block the law from taking effect on Jan. 19. The court is expected to announce its decision soon. In simple terms, if the Supreme Court doesn’t block the law and TikTok doesn’t sell the app to an American company, it’ll become illegal to distribute, host, or update the app. It doesn’t necessarily mean that TikTok is going to get immediately wiped off your phone; instead, it’ll stop getting updated, leading to degradation. It’s not immediately clear how soon the app could become unusable, or if ByteDance would choose to sell the app should the Supreme Court allow the law. Marketplaces like the App Store could face per-user fines — that would add up to billions of dollars — if they continue to allow downloads to new users after the law goes into effect.

The U.S. government maintains that the law is not a wholesale TikTok ban. “The law doesn’t say TikTok has to shut down,” Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett said during the SCOTUS hearing on Jan. 10. “It says ByteDance has to divest.”

We won’t know the fate of TikTok until the Supreme Court announces its decision, but according to The Verge, “the justices didn’t seem to buy TikTok’s interpretation of why the law violates its First Amendment rights.”