FOLLOWING the US government’s ban of short video platform TikTok scheduled for Sunday (Jan 19), many US citizens have turned to Chinese social media platform Rednote, also known as Xiaohongshu – viewed as an alternative in terms of its functionality.
The migration of US TikTok users to RedNote has sparked cultural exchange where US citizens are taking up Mandarin lessons in a bid to work around using the application since its default language is in Mandarin, Tech Crunch reported.
Earlier, it was reported that US users have encountered technical difficulties related to violating community guidelines.
The migration indicates TikTok users from the US sending a message to its government and similar competitors about the demand for social networking experiences China has created.
Language application Duolingo reportedly saw a 216% hike in US-based users learning Mandarin compared to last year, showing a sharp increase mid-January following the mass migration to the RedNote app.
The language app even jokingly posted on its official X account on Tuesday (Jan 14): “oh so NOW you’re learning (Mandarin)”, referring to the spike in users taking up Mandarin language courses.
Additionally, Duolingo noticed that in its “How did you hear about us” survey, many new users have selected TikTok as their answer, aligned with the increase in Mandarin learners from US.
Intelligence provider Appfigures also shared its data of Duolingo, showing a 36% rise in US downloads across the Apple App Store and Google Play as of January 3, affecting the app’s install base due to high demand for Duolingo’s language courses.
This could indicate that US users tried different Chinese social applications before joining RedNote.
