TikTok and its bite-sized videos as a global version of the Chinese app Douyin. Less than six years later, the social media platform is into the fabric of American consumerism, having shortened the shelf life of trends and revamped how people engage and fashion.
The popularity of TikTok coupled with its led Congress, citing , to pass a law that the video-sharing app unless its Chinese sells its stake. Both the company, ByteDance, and TikTok on First Amendment grounds.
But while the platform faces , its influence remains undisputed 鈥� and for now, arguably unrivaled.
Interest in bright pink blush and brown lipstick soared last year, for example, after the cosmetics were featured in TikTok videos with looks labeled as 鈥渃old girl鈥� and 鈥渓atte鈥� makeup. An abundance of clothing fads , from to similarly owe their pervasiveness to TikTok.
Silly video snippets have spun food hacks like 鈥渟mash burger鈥� tacos - a burger fried with a tortilla on top - and 鈥済irl dinners鈥� 鈥� shorthand for a snack plate that requires less cooking and cleaning up than a typical evening meal - into cultural currency. And sometimes, into actual dollars for creators and brands.
Plenty of TikTok-spawned crazes last only a week or two before losing steam. Yet even mini trends have challenged businesses to decipher which ones are worth jumping on and stocking up for. A majority of the more than 170 million Americans who use TikTok belong to the under-30 age group coveted by retailers, according to the Pew Research Center. Whether fans of the platform or not, shoppers may have a moment without knowing the origin story behind an eye-catching product.
鈥淭he impact has been almost immeasurable,鈥� Christopher Douglas, a senior manager of strategy at the influencer marketing agency Billion Dollar Boy, said.
What made TikTok such a trendsetter compared to predecessor platforms? Researchers and marketing analysts have often described the platform鈥檚 personalized recommendation algorithm as the 鈥渟ecret sauce鈥� of TikTok鈥檚 success. The company has disclosed little about the to populate users鈥� 鈥淔or You鈥� feeds.
Jake Bjorseth, founder of the advertising agency Trndsttrs, which specializes in , thinks the app鈥檚 use of an interest-based algorithm instead of personal contacts to connect like-minded people is what gave TikTok the edge. Predecessors like Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat were known more for peer-to-peer networks.
TikTok also changed the standard for what was considered desirable in social media content. Because the platform was designed to be easy to use, many videos lacked filters, lighting setups or production-level audio. 鈥淭hese minimally planned and produced鈥� recordings made seem more authentic and allowed them to develop more intimate relationships with their followers than earlier breeds of influencers, Bjorseth said.
In the early days of the app, TikTok recruited influencers from by paying them to join and post content, according to Brendan Gahan, the CEO of influencer marketing agency Creator Authority. 鈥淰ideo-makers with as few as 1,000 followers still can by promoting products in their videos, although those with at least 10,000 followers - and a minimum number of video views - are eligible for programs that pay them based on viewership.
The platform naturally has . Some experts argue that TikTok, like other social media sites, and promote hours of endless scrolling, as well as . Others accuse TikTok of , like young girls engaging in skin care rituals and procedures intended for older women.
Some observers accuse prolific TikTok video-makers of using gimmicks to concoct ersatz trends or repackaging the looks of an earlier era with attention-grabbing names. Yet for all the detractors who won鈥檛 mourn TikTok if it goes away, a of fans hopes it doesn鈥檛 come to that.
Niki Maragos, a 26-year-old digital marketer from Charlotte, North Carolina, is one. She credits TikTok with transforming her personal style. Before frequenting the platform, she wore clothes from a single genre at a time and followed the same makeup routine.
Now she鈥檚 into experimenting. To attend a recent music festival, for example, Maragos wore white ruffled bloomers, a black top and cowboy boots 鈥� a vintage-inspired look known as 鈥渃辞迟迟补驳别肠辞谤别鈥� in TikTok speak. She鈥檚 also tried applying faux freckles 鈥� a sun-kissed cosmetics trick that鈥檚 experiencing a renaissance 鈥� and latte-toned makeup.
鈥淭ikTok has allowed everybody to be their own fashionista,鈥� Maragos said. 鈥淚 have become free. I am going outside the box.鈥�
FASHION AND ACCESSORIES:
Casey Lewis, a trend analyst based in New York who previously worked as an editor at Teen Vogue, said TikTok鈥檚 clout in the fashion arena first became apparent to her when videos about Boston clogs overtook her 鈥淔or You鈥� feed in 2022.
Lewis thought it was odd since her brother, whom she described as a 鈥渇rat boy鈥� and not a fashionista, wore the in college. As the number of TikTok videos exploded, some creators took to advising their followers where they could find the suddenly sold-out clogs.
鈥淚鈥檓 not a psychologist, but I鈥檓 sure there鈥檚 some psychology where your brain goes from thinking like, 鈥楬ow weird? Is that fashion?鈥欌�� she said. 鈥淎nd then suddenly you鈥檙e obsessed with it.鈥�
Eventually, two other out-of-style shoes, UGG boots and , also saw their sales rebound after gaining a foothold with young consumers, Lewis said. The pace with which TikTok-shaped trends popped up 鈥� many of them tagged with the suffix 鈥渃ore鈥� in a reference to the wearer鈥檚 style 鈥� was so dizzying that Lewis devoted much of her Substack to them.
In the last year, the hot pink ensembles of coexisted with the down-to-earth, deliberately unsexy looks of 鈥渄adcore鈥� 鈥� think chunky white sneakers, baggy jeans and polo shirts. The oversized cardigans and linen separates of 鈥渃oastal grandmother,鈥� meanwhile, gave rise to 鈥渆clectic grandpa鈥� a unisex aesthetic featuring sweater vests, loafers and mismatched prints.
Looks based on the reimagined aesthetics of mob wives and Gilded Age author Edith Wharton also had short-lived moments. While the rotating cast of 鈥渃ores鈥� may not drive their adherents to buy entire wardrobes, they鈥檙e 鈥渋nfluencing spending in small ways, and that adds up,鈥� Lewis said.
鈥淚t鈥檚 easy to dismiss them as simply micro-trends that aren鈥檛 actually meaningful when it comes to consumer spending,鈥� she said. 鈥淏ut often, they actually are more meaningful.鈥�
Daniella L贸pez White, 21, who graduated from Emerson College in Boston this year and is on a tight budget, said TikTok influencers have helped her with tips on how to find affordable clothes at places like H&M and thrift shops. But the platform also connected L贸pez White to plus-size creators who feature fashions for larger-bodied women, which made her more confident in trying out new styles.
鈥淭hose TikTok trends really helped me figure out what parts of my body I want to accentuate and feel cute in and still incorporate my sense of style,鈥� she said.
After trying the 鈥渄ark academia鈥� trend, a blend of vintage fashion, tweed blazers and turtleneck sweaters, and 鈥渃ottagecore,鈥� she has moved onto the 鈥渙ffice siren鈥� look, which combines corporate clothing with form-fitting pieces like pencil skirts and cinched blazers.
FOOD:
With easy-to-follow cooking videos and clever hacks, TikTok became a go-to spot for home cooks during the COVID-19 pandemic. The platform made a star but in the process earned endorsements from some of the stars of the food world.
鈥淓very day, honestly, I am blown away by the creativity from the FoodTok community,鈥� restaurateur and chef Gordon Ramsay said in a TikTok video late last year.
Like the clothing styles of earlier eras, foods that had fallen out of fashion were resurrected . U.S. sales of cottage cheese jumped 34% between April 2022 and April 2024 after videos promoting cottage cheese ice cream, cottage cheese toast and other recipes racked up millions of views.
Ben Sokolsky, the general manager of sales and marketing for Dallas-based dairy company Daisy Brand, said cottage cheese is seeing its highest sustained growth in nearly 50 years. The curdled milk product used to be a 鈥渟ecret sensation,鈥� but social media helped expose new customers to the protein-rich, low-carb food, Sokolsky said.
The trend has had real impacts for Daisy Brand, which saw its cottage cheese sales double over the last five years. In April, the company announced a $626.5 million investment to expand a manufacturing facility in Iowa with at least 106 new jobs.
Some topics that went viral on TikTok even spawned analog equivalents. Last summer, TikToker Olivia Maher posted what she called her 鈥済irl dinner鈥� of bread, cheese, pickles and grapes. It was a hit, with more than 1.6 million views. A handful of 鈥済irl dinner鈥� cookbooks soon followed.
But the eagerness to try trendy foods had its downside. A 14-year-old in Massachusetts died after trying an extremely spicy tortilla chip popularized in so-called One Chip Challenge videos on TikTok and other social media sites. of the boy, who had a congenital heart defect, found that eating a large quantity of chile pepper extract caused his death. Paqui, the maker of the chip, pulled it off the market.
BEAUTY:
TikTok has upended the cosmetics industry by promoting do-it-yourself skin and hair treatments, causing ingredients to get labeled as the next miracle cure or to be avoided, and featuring videos of people gleefully applying or panning the contents of their latest shopping hauls.
, which first became popular on YouTube, are also everywhere these days in shorter forms mainly due to TikTok. Makeup tutorials also were a fixture on YouTube before TikTok turbo-charged purchases for creating a new look du jour, such as the 鈥済lazed donut鈥� skin and 鈥渟trawberry makeup鈥� popularized by .
Influencers on TikTok and elsewhere have made freckles an asset with clips showing how to add faux ones with eyebrow pencils or broccoli florets. The 鈥渃lean girl鈥� aesthetic, a renamed version of the no-makeup makeup look, prompted both luxury and drugstore brands to rush out their own versions of skin tints and lip oils.
Tiffany Watson, a college student who posts makeup tutorials on TikTok, says the platform has made the beauty space more fun by giving specific looks winsome titles.
鈥淚t brings lightheartedness. It鈥檚 fun to be able to put a cute little name on it, try something new and then see a community of people trying the same thing,鈥� said Watson, who currently has more than 31,000 followers on TikTok and has done paid partnerships with brands like Colourpop Cosmetics.
Similar to YouTube, TikTok has helped popularize so-called 鈥渄upes鈥� 鈥� less expensive alternatives to pricier products 鈥� to the benefit of brands such as , Revolution Beauty and NYX .
鈥淭ikTok is one of the highly effective platforms for our community to talk to us 鈥� and each other 鈥� directly,鈥� Kory Marchisotto, the chief marketing officer at cosmetics brand e.l.f. Beauty, said. 鈥淭hey鈥檒l directly compare it to more expensive premium products, sometimes as a split-screen with e.l.f. and another brand.鈥�
Some veteran users of TikTok have noted the platform is almost too good in its role as both a tastemaker and a . Videos of influencers 鈥渄ecluttering鈥� drawers filled with piles of barely used lipsticks, blushes and eyeshadow palettes are often as popular as the ones of people reviewing the products from their shopping sprees.
On the positive side, its defenders credit TikTok with promoting a more inclusive image of beauty and forcing brands to create products for a wider range of skin tones and hair types. Beauty retailer Sephora, which has more than 1.3 million followers on TikTok, announced last year a partnership to help new brands owned by women of color to expand their presence on the platform.
Though the desire for clicks can encourage creators to follow the same hair and makeup trends, it also has given a a larger platform on which to champion or call out brands, Lewis said. She pointed to a recent controversy involving Youthforia, a brand that was criticized by some Black content creators after it released a foundation shade that resembled jet black paint.
鈥淲ith TikTok, people who otherwise weren鈥檛 heard were suddenly heard,鈥� Lewis said.
Watson, too, says the platform has helped bring more diversity to beauty videos compared to other platforms, where users had to intentionally seek out the type of creators they wanted to follow.
鈥淚 see more diversity on TikTok because (with) every video you鈥檙e swiping, you鈥檙e seeing somebody new,鈥� she said.
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