TikTok is back on Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store in the United States after a short-lived exclusion caused by concerns regarding its Chinese parent company and national security risks.
The short-form video-sharing app TikTok has been reinstalled on Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store in the United States following an earlier removal for reasons of legal ambiguity. The app was removed after a U.S. law mandating the divestment of its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to drop its U.S. operations over national security issues went into effect on January 19, 2025.
Even after President Donald Trump signed an executive order postponing enforcement of this legislation by 75 days, Apple and Google had not included TikTok on their platforms, hoping for official confirmation. These followed when U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote a letter to the companies promising they would not be subject to legal sanction for carrying the app.
This expansion is crucial to the growth of TikTok in America, where the platform has a user base of approximately 170 million. The situation, however, remains fluid, with future business and legal implications for Google and Apple in the form of possible fines, as well as ongoing antitrust issues.
The fate of TikTok in America depends on whether ByteDance can sell its American business and negotiate with the different stakeholders involved, including whether a U.S. sovereign-wealth fund might take a sizeable stake in the firm.
