Taipei, Taiwan – As a TikTok ban looms in the United States, young Americans are flocking to the Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu as “TikTok refugees” in search of a similar experience.
The app has risen to the top spot on the iOS and Google Play stores in the US in recent days as users prepare for TikTok to be banned on national security grounds from Sunday unless Chinese parent company ByteDance divests its ownership.
Chinese lifestyle app Lemon8, which is also owned by ByteDance, has ranked as the second most downloaded app.
Xiaohongshu, which has been described as China’s answer to Instagram, allows users to post photos, videos and text and is known for its female-heavy user base.
While boasting about 300 million monthly active users, Xiaohongshu’s reach is smaller than that of other popular apps in China, such as Sina Weibo and WeChat, which claim 1.2 billion-plus users.
A surge in new users, some of them describing themselves as “TikTok refugees,” is now flooding the app’s “Discover” page with videos seeking tips on how to use “RedNote,” the app’s new nickname in the US.
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“Hello. I don’t know what’s happening any more. Americans are coming here. So sorry if y’all hate us. I promise we’ll do our best,” a female user calling herself “Star404” said in a short-form video posted on Tuesday.
“Don’t even worry, we’re going to do so great. This is so much better than TikTok. Just not Meta. Instagram reels, I can kind of dig. Facebook and YouTube shorts, no shot. Never happening,” she said.
The irony of many users moving from one Chinese-owned app to another has not been lost on observers like Ryan Broderick, the author of Garbage Day, a newsletter that covers the internet.
“It’s definitely funny that American teenagers are protesting the looming TikTok ban by using a much more culturally Chinese app,” Broderick told Al Jazeera.
“At the moment, RedNote doesn’t seem to be siloing Chinese content or requiring users to have a Chinese phone number, so it’s turned into a sort of fun cultural chaos on the app, an experience that never really even happened on TikTok,” he said.
The post by “Star404” racked up more than 4,000 comments in 24 hours, mostly from Chinese users welcoming her to the platform or joking about language challenges.
Another user, “Fern,” expressed her gratitude to the flood of Chinese followers that came her way after joining the platform.
“We need to talk about you guys blowing up my video about moving to Rednote to 50,000 new followers in less than 24 hours. You guys are insane,” she said.
“But thank you so much for all the support, I really appreciate it.”
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While amusing to many Chinese Xiaohongshu users, the surge in American users has reportedly put the app’s owner in an awkward spot.
Chinese media outlet PConline on Tuesday reported that Xiaohongshu employees have been instructed to “not discuss, not promote, and not share” news about their new US user base, citing sources within the company.
“This wave of traffic has become the sword of Damocles hanging over Xiaohongshu’s head. In fact, for Xiaohongshu, which inexplicably received this traffic, the risks far outweigh the opportunities,” the report said.
Those potential risks include regulatory complications.
Chinese social media platforms typically require users to register with a Chinese phone number, while content is subject to government censorship.
For this reason, Chinese tech companies often create domestic and foreign versions of their apps, said Yiwen Lu, a researcher at ChinaTalk, a newsletter and podcast focusing on Chinese technology.
TikTok is an international version of Douyin, while Lemon8 was specifically designed by ByteDance for the foreign market.
For now, Chinese and American users are seeing the same content on Xiaohongshu.
However, some users have reminded their American counterparts that the app comes with its own set of rules.
“Friendly reminder: On Chinese social media platforms, please do not mention sensitive topics such as politics, religion, and drugs!!! Please adhere to the One China policy and reject pornography, gambling, and drugs,” one user wrote under Star404’s post.
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“[You] can say everything here, except the history [of China] from 1949-2025,” another user said.
ChinaTalk’s Lu said that American users will have a hard time replicating their TikTok experience on the app – especially when it comes to monetising content.
“The monetisation models vary greatly – XHS positions itself as a shopping platform, with most creators earning revenue through paid partnerships. This difference makes it challenging for creators to fully transition their work and income streams to XHS in the short term,” Lu told Al Jazeera.
Livestream shopping, a hugely popular form of e-commerce in China, has taken off on Xiahongshu in recent months.
In the US, many TikTok users still shop through links to Amazon or the shopping platform LTK, short for “Like to Know.”
Lu and Broderick both expressed doubt that the influx of US users would last due to differences between the platforms and the fact many users had joined as an act of protest.
Still, the migration to Xiaohongshu should serve as a warning to the US government and Big Tech, Broderick said.
“It’s a funny way to hopefully make US politicians realize that Chinese apps are coming for the US whether they like it or not,” he said.
“And, similarly, it’s a good way of letting Silicon Valley know that their products are stagnating and no amount of federal bans are going to make young people excited about Meta products again.”
