How to Use TikTok in the US Even If It’s Banned
The deadline is almost here: unless the Supreme Court steps in and saves it, TikTok will be legally banned in the United States on January 19th. If you’re one of the 170 million Americans who use TikTok every day, you might be getting a little upset about the situation.
Here’s the good news: Even if the US bans TikTok in the country, it won’t stop you from accessing it. Of course, this may make it significantly more difficult to access, but with a little preparation, you’ll be able to keep scrolling on January 19th just like the day before, at least for a while.
Why is the US trying to ban TikTok?
We’ve covered the situation in our explanation here , but here’s a summary. The US has long been concerned about TikTok, dating back to the first Trump administration. The problem has a lot to do with national security: TikTok is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, which must comply with Chinese law. As such, there are concerns that ByteDance could hand over data on the platform’s millions of American users to the Chinese government, as well as manipulate its notoriously addictive algorithm to control what content Americans see.
Congress and the president aren’t necessarily focused on the app itself: it’s the Chinese government. Therefore, the “ban” is only part of the law that President Biden signed back in April. This text gave ByteDance nine months to find an American buyer for TikTok in the United States. If this were the case, ByteDance could sell its stake in TikTok and the app could continue to operate without interruption. However, the company decided not to do this, insisting that TikTok (and its own algorithm) are not for sale. So here we are.
Regardless of your opinion on the matter, unless the Supreme Court intervenes, the ban will happen. However, you can control your ability to access TikTok in America after the ban. Here’s how:
Make sure you have TikTok on your phone.
If the ban does pass, it is highly likely that companies like Apple and Google will remove TikTok from their US app stores. When this happens, the app will no longer be available for download through official channels: if you try to search for TikTok in the iOS App Store or Google Play Store, you’ll likely find a bunch of similar social media apps or apps made for TikTok rather than TikTok itself.
This is not surprising: the ban wouldn’t be so big if the government couldn’t force companies to remove apps from their marketplaces. However, while the force can ensure that apps like TikTok are banned from app stores, they cannot actually remove the apps from your device. If you already have TikTok on your iPhone or Android device, it will remain there until you delete it yourself.
If you already have TikTok on your phone, great. If not, and you want to make sure you can continue to use the app after January 19th, download it now. Here are some links to different marketplaces to help you get started:
-
iOS App Store (also available on iPadOS, iMessage and VisionOS)
Download unpublished TikTok (Android only)
If you forget to download the app before it takes effect, don’t worry: you can still download it, at least on Android.
Unlike iOS (at least in the US), Android allows you to download apps, or in other words, install apps from unofficial sources. This has long been an advantage of Android over iOS, and while Apple has opened up sideloading for users in the EU , it remains Android-only for most of the world. So, if you really want it, you can download the latest version of TikTok on your Android device even if it is no longer available on the Play Store.
One thing to be careful about here, however, is that sideloading offers little protection that the app you’re installing is legitimate. This is why it is always better to use official channels whenever possible. Google doesn’t always detect malicious apps , but it does find a lot of them. By acting fraudulently, you run a certain amount of risk, especially as the world becomes aware that Android users in the US are looking for unofficial TikTok downloads.
If you go this route, use APKMirror rather than a quick Google search. The site is trusted and a popular place to download unpublished materials. Just be sure to download TikTok itself and not some other app option you might see in a search.
Get a VPN
While no one can remove TikTok from your phone, they can break it. Again, it’s unclear what exactly will happen if the ban goes into effect, but there’s a good chance ByteDance will simply block online access to the app for US users. After the 19th, you can open TikTok, but instead of logging in. screen or your FYP, you will be greeted with a message telling you why TikTok is banned in your country. (Perhaps we’ll see something saucy about the First Amendment in “Land of the Free.”)
This will be enough for many (if not most) who will then switch to American short video apps, but not for you: instead, you can continue to use TikTok as if it had never been banned. all because you will have a VPN installed on your device.
A VPN (virtual private network) allows you to access parts of the Internet that would not otherwise be allowed by your country or government. It works by encrypting your connection and routing it through servers outside your country. For example, if connections to TikTok are not allowed in the US, a VPN can make it appear as if you are connecting to the Internet from, say, Portugal. You can watch TikTok in Portugal without any problems, so if the TikTok servers think you’re in Europe’s westernmost country, they’ll connect you. The ban was avoided.
There are plenty of VPNs to choose from, but you don’t have to get fancy (or even spend money) to access TikTok after a ban. All you need is a VPN that actively routes your traffic to a country that hasn’t banned the app, and a service that will route traffic within apps, not just inside your web browser. Otherwise, you will only be able to access TikTok in your browser. While this is fine on a Mac, accessing TikTok through an app is much more convenient and most of us will probably want to use it anyway. So, it’s worth prioritizing your VPN.
For example, Proton VPN has an excellent free tier and should work on the TikTok app on both iOS and Android. I just tested it on Tubi, which blocked me from using it: Proton VPN routed my traffic through Amsterdam, a country that Tubi does not support, and since Tubi thinks I’m trying to access it from Amsterdam, Tubi is not suitable for me . So the opposite should be true when trying to access TikTok in the US.
Don’t use the app forever
I know I just said the TikTok app is the best way to experience the platform, but if the US bans TikTok next week, you really shouldn’t use it forever.
Here’s the thing: TikTok will remain on your iPhone or Android if you already have it installed. But if developers no longer support an app in the US, that means your app won’t get any new features added or any bug fixes that might appear. So, you may experience some strange glitches or glitches the longer you use the app after the ban, and you won’t see any changes TikTok makes to the app in supported parts of the world.
But that’s not my concern. If the only problem was TikTok being unstable, well, no matter. But ultimately the application becomes a security risk. Just as TikTok developers won’t be able to implement new features or fix bugs in the app, they won’t be able to fix any security vulnerabilities they discover down the line. And there will be security vulnerabilities in the future: it’s just an inevitability of software. Over time, there will be flaws that TikTok will fix for the app in the countries it supports, but since it will be cut off from the US, you won’t see these updates. Instead, you’ll be using an application with a growing list of security flaws that attackers will exploit to their advantage. This probably won’t happen overnight, but after a while the app becomes a real threat to persist on your device, especially when attackers know that in a large country like the United States, there are people using the app without security updates.
Ironically, by banning the app on national security grounds, the US government has turned it into a security threat of a different kind.
But will you want to continue using TikTok?
The big question in a world where the US has successfully banned TikTok is: Do you really want to keep using the app? Of course, things will likely seem the same at first, but as the app becomes more buggy and less secure, the experience will undoubtedly lose its luster.
But it goes beyond that. American creators will likely not bother posting on an app that is banned in their country and will switch entirely to other well-known platforms such as Instagram and YouTube. As more and more creators leave, you’ll see less of the content you’re used to – content that can be found in non-banned apps.
Of course, the rest of the world will still be posting on TikTok, but it will be interesting to see if there is any ripple effect from this potential ban. Will the loss of hundreds of millions of users inspire creators outside the US to focus on platforms that Americans can use? If so, will TikTok start losing even more content?
There are simply too many unknowns at this point. As far as we know, the Supreme Court is going to save TikTok and this entire post is going to be full of useless advice. However, there is a very real chance that this ban will actually pass, and with it a likely seismic shift in the future of short-form video. If you follow this advice, you’ll at least have a front-row seat to the future of TikTok, whatever that may be.