India represented TikTok’s biggest overseas market, accounting for around a third of worldwide downloads, with over 200 million users. Then in June, ByteDance’s TikTok and 58 other Chinese apps were banned in India following a border clash between the two countries.
The ban further expanded to 118 Chinese apps in early September, as tensions between the two countries continued.
Although YouTube and Instagram are widely used in India, their reach is largely centered in the country’s big cities, while TikTok had gained an important market share in small towns thanks to its support to Indian vernacular languages.
Currently, the void left by TikTok’s absence has led to a surge in demand for local alternatives, representing both opportunities and challenges for Indian players. Foreign competitors will also try to grab a piece of the Indian market, while local apps have to scale up to capitalize on TikTok’s absence.
In KrASIA’s newest video, we took a look at five local short-video apps hoping to benefit from this unique opportunity:
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