TikTok's Traffic Bounces Back Despite Being Pulled Off App Stores

Despite being removed from app stores and facing a potential U.S. ban, TikTok has regained nearly 90% of its user traffic, according to Cloudflare Radar. 'DNS traffic for TikTok-related domains has continued to recover since service restoration, and is currently about 10% lower than pre-shutdown level,' said David Belson, head of data insight at Cloudflare. CNBC reports: The data from Cloudflare shows that, for the most part, TikTok has managed to maintain the bulk of its users and creators in the U.S. despite going offline for about 14 hours and remaining off of the Apple or Google app stores.

As for its alternatives, Cloudflare's data shows a spike in traffic the day of the temporary ban, with levels remaining steadily higher in the following week. Traffic for alternatives began to grow a week ahead of the expected shutdown, driven by the increased popularity of RedNote, known as Xiaohongshu in China, Belson said.

But traffic to TikTok alternatives peaked on Jan. 19, the day TikTok returned online, he added. 'DNS traffic fell rapidly once the shutdown ended, and has continued to slowly decline over the last week and a half,' Belson said.

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