Sensor Tower: Xiaohongshu's downloads fell 91% in five days after Apple and Google relisted TikTok on their US app stores on February 13, while TikTok's doubled
Vlad Savov / Bloomberg :
Context & Ripple Effects
Xiaohongshu’s US download surge had emerged only weeks earlier, when the app drew more than 700,000 new users in two days and US downloads rose sharply. The reversal after TikTok’s relisting suggests that burst was closely tied to TikTok’s temporary distribution disruption rather than a settled change in user preference.
TikTok already had a long record of app-store scale, including its earlier passage of 2 billion downloads across Apple and Google stores. The current data shows how quickly that installed demand can reassert itself once normal store availability returns.
First-order effects
- TikTok regained a major acquisition channel in the US: its downloads doubled in the five days after Apple and Google relisted it.
- Xiaohongshu’s downloads fell 91% over the same period, sharply reducing the immediate benefit from the earlier influx of US users to Xiaohongshu.
Second-order effects
- Xiaohongshu now has to convert the users it gained during TikTok’s absence into retained users; download momentum alone no longer differentiates it once TikTok is readily available.
- Apple and Google’s store-listing decisions become a direct lever on short-term user acquisition for both platforms, concentrating distribution power with the mobile gatekeepers.
Third-order effects
- The episode reinforces a winner-take-most dynamic in short-form social: a leading app’s temporary distribution interruption can create openings for substitutes, but those openings may close rapidly when access is restored.
- If such listing changes remain consequential, platform-risk planning will increasingly include app-store availability alongside product competition and user retention.
The trend: This is one data point in the growing importance of app-store distribution decisions as a determinant of consumer social-app growth and competitive churn.