TikTok saw a significant increase in popularity during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in the United States, with a growth of *** percent among 15-25 year old users after the pandemic broke out and people started working and studying primarily from home.

TikTok saw an unprecedented increase in popularity during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in the Nordic region. The largest increase, of up to 800 percent was observed among Danish youth. While two percent of them used TikTik before the COVID-19 outbreak, the corresponding share during the pandemic was 18 percent. Overall, TikTok became more popular in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland during the pandemic, regardless of the users’ age.

The rise of TikTok   

TikTok is a Chinese video-sharing social network, initially released in 2018, as Musical.ly. Over the period from 2017 to 2020, the app generated increasingly larger engagement rates, reaching nearly 15 million daily active users via iOS as of May 2020 on a global scale. Among the most followed accounts in Norway were the pop duo Marcus & Martinus.

COVID-19 on social media   

As of March 2020, almost all the most popular hashtags on social media in Sweden were related to the coronavirus. In fact, a recent survey showed that especially younger individuals worldwide seemed to rely on social media for updates on the coronavirus that same month . In contrast, the figures were much lower for people aged 55 or older. Nevertheless, social media use generally increased during the pandemic and facilitated the spread of news regarding the coronavirus. In some cases, even false information.

TikTok saw a significant increase in popularity during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in the United Kingdom (UK), with a growth of 44 percent among 15-25 year old users after the pandemic started.

Scientific and moderate exercise is an effective remedy to boost the immune system and minimize the risk of infection in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemic period. In this context, social media platforms play an essential role in communicating scientific fitness at home. Based on the integrated analysis of communication, physical geography, and health geography, this article takes short fitness-based videos on TikTok as the research object and comprehensively uses text analysis, mathematical statistics, and spatial analysis to reveal the characteristics of communication elements, fitness preferences, and the spatiotemporal evolution of these short videos, and to explore the communication mechanism and optimization path of short videos. The results show that: (1) the communication information focusing on “fighting against the epidemic and keeping fit at home” is made into short videos by female youth. Through the communication channels mainly composed of texts, pictures, and audio, the communication subjects carry out multilevel interactive communication with the communication objects; (2) fitness preferences are mainly composed of dances, unarmed fitness, and fitness with equipment; (3) from the perspective of time, taking February 20 as the node, the daily number of released short videos shows a trend of “increase before decrease”; from the perspective of space, the distribution is significantly unbalanced across provinces, and the direction is not apparent; and (4) this article explores the communication mechanism and targeted optimization countermeasures of short fitness-based videos on TikTok in China's COVID-19 epidemic period.

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TikTok saw a huge increase in popularity during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in four selected Nordic countries. The share of Danes using TikTok increased from one percent before the COVID-19 outbreak, to four percent during the pandemic. This was a significant increase of 300 percent.

From “get ready with me” videos to reels of “the 7 essentials you need in your purse right now,” and “the latest fashion trends,” young women and teenage girls’ TikTok and Instagram feeds are filled with all the ways they need to better themselves. At first glance, these posts seem harmless; however, seeing video after video of how you need to better your life in unachievable ways leaves the self feeling inadequate.

The beauty industry is a multi-billion-dollar industry that is expected to reach almost $736 billion in global revenue by 2028. Making up more than 20 percent of the entire e-commerce market, the beauty industry has been propelled by the expansion of social media since the COVID-19 Pandemic. Feminist artists like Martha Rosler began critiquing the problems associated with the beauty industry back in the 70s, but the problem of marketing to women has only grown since. Sophisticated algorithms, propelled by watching their users’ every move, project enviable lifestyles through influencers' perfectly lit, clean, and hypnotic videos and posts. Today, the targeted social media ads, influencers promoting products, and videos telling women how to create “the perfect life” cause young women, and even younger girls, to self-objectify.

Through mixed media drawings, I expose the absurdity of the beauty industry propelled by social media by exaggerating the images we are exposed to every day. I juxtapose digital elements of social media against drawn marks that masquerade as beauty products. Oftentimes only fragments of the image are rendered to completion, coinciding with the ways in which women are picked apart and objectified in the media. By mixing figuration and abstraction and calling on feminist theorists, I highlight the internal conflict that arises from the critical self-evaluation that I, and many other young women, have grown accustomed to with the use of the internet and social media.

Launched first in India after the TikTok ban in August 2020, YouTube Shorts rolled out globally in June 2021. The feature, which is accessible via the YouTube app, reached two billion monthly logged-in users as of July 2023. YouTube has been heavily promoting its short-video format platform since its global launch, including redirecting users automatically to Shorts when the YouTube app is opened and launching the YouTube Shorts Funds to entice creators' participation. In 2022, user and travel vlogger Shangerdanger took the crown for the most popular Short on YouTube, with his video “Diver cracks Egg at 45 ft Deep".

TikTok versus Reels: competitors’ comparison Launched in September 2016 in China as Douyin, TikTok went on to become of the most engaging social media platforms for global users, challenging mainstream social media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube in their primary markets such as the United States, Brazil, and Japan. TikTok’s popularity exploded between 2019 and 2020, as the work was experiencing the effects of the global COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. Reels, Instagram’s in-app short video experience, debuted in 2020 as Facebook (now Meta Platforms) bet on the short-video feature to improve users’ engagement. While videos were an already popular format on Facebook and Instagram, social short videos soon became an even more popular format with users. As of June 2022, the average video viewing rate for Reels on Instagram was 2.54 percent, while for videos was of 1.74 percent as of June 2022.

Content is key: creators drive an entire economy As of July 2022, influencers on TikTok and YouTube generate the largest share of video views, over 90 percent, while content produced by media companies and brands constitute only a smaller part of the video views generated on the two video platforms. As content creators are emerging even more clearly as the backbone of social media marketing and advertising, it is not a surprise that an entire economy devoted to their needs and presence has developed in recent years. In 2022, companies supporting the creators’ economy by offering merchandising services had an annual average revenue of over 500 million U.S. dollars, while companies overseeing subscription services generated approximately 300 million U.S. dollars.

Mixed-effects model predicting the valence of video content created by older adults on TikTok.

This renaking provided by Airnow PLC graph shows the most downloaded apps on Apple app store in France between March 27 and April 3, 2020 (thousands of downloads). Plato came in first with 201.8 thousand downloads during the confinement period after the coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak in France, followed by ZOOM Cloud Meetings with 166.3 thousand downoads. Houseparty ranked in third place with 106.5 thousands and Tik Tok occupied the fourth place with 93 thousand downloads that week. From the same source, a ranking of the most downloaded apps on the Google Play Store is available.

According to a survey on online shopping in China, the usage of live streaming e-commerce grew by 6.3 percent among respondents during the COVID-19 outbreak. Meanwhile, shopping via short videos increased by 2.6 percent compared to before the pandemic. Douyin (known as Tik Tok globally) and Kuaishou were two popular short video platforms among Chinese online shoppers.

Estimates for the main effects and interaction effects of frequency of COVID-19 information on TikTok and trust in COVID-19 information on well-being.

TikTok saw an exceptional increase of monthly active users worldwide from 2019 to 2021, at 38 percent. The short-form video sharing app was used by 689 million individuals monthly as of 2021, compared to 500 million in 2019. Other leading social networks that increased with over 30 percent were Pinterest and Reddit.

The coronavirus pandemic is one of the factors that have resulted in an increased interest in social networking, with billions of people in lockdown, working and studying from home, and in need of socializing.

Launched in 2015, Triller is a social media and short video platform headquartered in the United States. In 2020, the app saw approximately 20.6 million downloads worldwide, as a result of the acceleration in the usage of social media and mobile apps during the first global outbreaks of the COVID-19 pandemic and the banning of its competitor TikTok from the Indian market. In 2023, Triller was estimated to have generated over 1.1 million global app downloads.

As of the fourth quarter of 2023, among Norwegian online users aged 18 to 29 years, 66 percent of men and 67 percent of women were using YouTube. The platform was less popular among the older generations and only 20 percent of the women aged 60 years or older used the platform. As of July 2024, Norwegian DJ Alan Walker hosted reportedly had the most popular YouTube channel for users in the country, with almost 45.6 million subscribers. YouTube usage in the Nordics With its mix of user-generated content, professional videos, and on-demand selection, YouTube is undoubtedly one of the most popular digital video platforms for Nordic users. As of 2020, 78 percent of YouTube users in Denmark stated that they were using the platform weekly, while the figure rose to 86 percent of respondents in the case of Finnish users. In Sweden, users engaging with the popular video platform at least once per week were 88 percent of the surveyed YouTube viewers. Digital video usage in the Nordics At the end of 2020, Netflix was the most popular video streaming and download service in Norway, with 84 percent of respondents reporting to use the subscription streaming platform, while Norwegian public broadcasting online service NRK ranked second with 68 percent of respondents stating their preference for the platform. In 2020, Finland audiences appeared to prefer online TV services like Yle Areena over SVoD services like Netflix, with 74 percent of respondents reporting to use the first, and 49 percent respondents reporting to use the latter. Additionally, with the global outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, the popularity of social video platform TikTok grew. During the pandemic, 10 percent of the Norwegian digital population, as well as seven percent of the Finnish digital population reported using TikTok.

As of January 2025, ************************** was the YouTube made-for-kids channel with the most subscribers, at *** million. ************* ranked second, with approximately *** million subscribers, followed by *************** with *** million subscribers. Content for children has become increasingly popular recently, and some of the highest-earning YouTubers are under the age of **. YouTube is the children’s favorite While mobile phones and tablets can be useful to complete school assignments, mobile gaming and watching YouTube videos were the most popular activities for kids worldwide in 2021. YouTube achieved popularity among children worldwide thanks to the curated content tailor-made to appease younger audiences. The YouTube video *****************,” first published in ****, was the first YouTube video to surpass ** billion views in January 2021, and sits at over ** billion views as of January 2024. Children video apps usage As in the case of grownups, video apps have been acquiring acquired larger user bases and reaching unprecedented engagement levels among children during the first years of the global COVID-19 pandemic. While several social media platforms have been adding video features to their experiences, ****************** were the most popular online video platforms for children: as of April 2024, the YouTube app usage rate among global children using Android devices was ** percent, while TikTok ranked second with a usage rate of almost ** percent. In the U.S., children spent over *** hour daily on the YouTube app in 2023, while TikTok occupied U.S. children for *** minutes daily on average in the same year.

In 2024, Facebook was the leading social media platform for news in Thailand, which was used by ** percent of respondents. Other leading platforms for news consumption were YouTube and LINE. LINE, a popular messaging app in Thailand, has also recently created the ‘LINE Today’ section as a news source within the LINE app. Social media as a news source for the younger generation Social media is an efficient way for audiences to access news and share content, especially since it is less regulated than other forms of media in Thailand. Popular social media platforms among Thais such as Facebook and YouTube are the major sites for audiences to join in on live events and exercise freedom of speech. The LINE messaging application is also the main platform for users to share the news. Additionally, Twitter and TikTok are playing an increasingly significant role in shaping how news and sentiment on recent events are discussed, such as the recent youth-led protests in Thailand. The fast and unregulated form of communication on social media, therefore, has cultivated a preference for online news among the younger generation in Thailand. The rise of fake news   The ease of sharing news and stories through social media has also led to an issue of fake news in Thailand. Recent events such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the political movements in the country have led to a proliferation of fake news. The COVID-19 pandemic, in particular, has been one of the major causes of the increase in the spread of fake news, especially regarding the information on COVID-19 preventative measures. Since fake news has been rampant in the country, there have been legal restrictions on how content is created and shared in Thailand.

In 2024, Sea Limited's Shopee, a Singaporean technology company, was the leading e-commerce website in Southeast Asia, with average monthly web sessions of 560 million. This was followed by Lazada, which is owned by the Chinese Alibaba Group, and Tokopedia, owned by an Indonesian technology company. The rise of Shopee Online shopping usage in Southeast Asia has been on a steadily increasing during the past few years, partly driven by the COVID-19 pandemic beginning in 2020. Digital services accelerated after the pandemic, which helped Shopee accumulate a gross merchandise value of over 20 billion U.S. dollars. While it is a Singaporean company, most web visits to Shopee were generated from users in Indonesia and Vietnam, reflecting the high internet user penetration in these countries and the shifting shopping behavior of a new generation. The new ways of commerce Many consumers already indulge in online shopping on websites, but new shopping experiences are making their way into the region. Live commerce and social commerce have become a trend in Southeast Asia, encouraging consumers to indulge in shopping while browsing social media or watching livestream videos. With current trends emerging, Shopee also expanded its platform for live commerce usage and became the second most popular platform to watch live commerce in Southeast Asia, after TikTok. Consumers in the region liked to watch live commerce content because of the good deals it offered, as well as real-time product reviews. Livestreams allow consumers to interact with streamers or other buyers for a more interactive shopping experience, drawing in a wide array of consumers.

The number of YouTube users in the Netherlands grew to roughly 9.9 million in 2023, up from 9.1 million reported in 2020 and 2021. This makes the video sharing platform one of the most popular social media in the country, surpassed only by WhatsApp.

Online video in the Netherlands Music videos were the most popular type of content for users in the Netherlands as of the third quarter of 2022, followed by comedy, memes, and viral videos – which made platforms as YouTube and TikTok particularly popular. Approximately 17 percent of Dutch respondents reported watching influencer videos or vlogs. When it came to film and long-length video streaming, Netflix and Disney+ were the most used platforms in the Netherlands as of March 2023, with 70 percent of respondents and 45 percent of respondents reporting to subscribe to the popular SVOD services.

Mobile video in the Netherlands As of March 2023, smartphones were the most used devices to watch online videos, followed by Smart TVs and laptops. During the COVID-19 pandemic, almost four in 10 internet users in the Netherlands reported engaging with their mobile devices to watch online videos. While this value decreased to interest around 36 percent of Dutch internet users in 2022, mobile video viewership remains higher than before the pandemic in the last measured year. In 2022, Disney+ was the highest-grossing video app in the Netherlands, generating over 10.45 million U.S. dollars from users in-app purchases. TikTok and YouTube followed, with revenues of nine million U.S. dollars and 5.5 million U.S. dollars, respectively. Netflix, which extended its new policy on password sharing to the Netherlands during the last week of May 2023, generated roughly 3.5 million U.S. dollars in app revenues during 2022.

Social media is one of the go-to news sources in the United States – over one third of U.S. adults responding to a 2022 survey got their news from social media platforms every day, and a further 22 percent did so a few times or at least once per week. After the surge in social media news consumption in 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, daily engagement fell in 2021, but the increase the following year suggests that daily news access on social networks could continue to grow in years to come.

The most popular social sites for news

An annual report surveying U.S. adults from 2019 to 2022 revealed that Facebook was the most popular social network used for news, followed by YouTube. Important to note here though is that TikTok was not included in the survey question for those years, a platform increasingly popular with younger generations. Whilst the share of adults regularly using TikTok for news aged 50 years or above was just five percent, among those aged between 18 and 29 years the figure was over five times higher.

Meanwhile, Twitter is journalists’ preferred social media site, with the share who use Twitter for their job at almost 70 percent. Since Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter however, some journalists raised concerns about the future of free speech on the platform.

Gen Z and social media news consumption

A 2022 survey found that half of all Gen Z respondents used social media for news every day. Gen Z is driving growth in social media news usage, a trend which will continue if the younger consumers belonging to this generation increase their engagement with news as they age.