TikTok will have 834.3 million monthly users worldwide in 2023, according to our forecast. It is now the third-largest of the Big Five worldwide social networks (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, and Twitter). 

Its ascent to global phenomenon has been incredibly quick. TikTok more than doubled its worldwide user base between 2019 and 2021 (291.4 million to 655.9 million). This year, the viral short-form video app will see double-digit growth before dropping to single-digit increases going forward. Still, that growth is at almost double the rate of Snapchat and 2.5 times the rate of Instagram.

By 2025, it will approach 1 billion users.

According to Insider Intelligence’s first-ever forecast for time spent on social platforms by age, TikTok users ages 25 to 54—largely the millennial and Gen X generations—will spend over 45 minutes per day on the app, well above time spent by 25- to 54-year-old users of other social platforms.

The combined footprint of ByteDance’s two social media apps (Douyin in China and TikTok in the rest of the world) will stand at 1.70 billion monthly users in 2023, amounting to 36.5% of worldwide internet users and 45.2% of social network users.

By 2026, Douyin will have almost the same number of users as China’s popular super app, WeChat—another sign of ByteDance’s growing dominance. The threat of US regulation on TikTok still looms, but ByteDance’s massive footprint cannot be ignored.