TikTok by the Numbers: Stats and Facts for Digital Advertisers

The TikTok era of social advertising has arrived.

Moving way beyond its roots as a forum for lip-syncing and dancing teens, this short-form video app has blown up the model of what a social network can be, and it is increasingly a must-buy for a growing number of advertisers. TikTok isn’t the same as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube, where advertising typically equates to buttoned-up and polished productions. To excel on this channel, brands must embrace creator-led, user-generated, unfiltered content to tell their story. And above all, they must be authentic. Indeed, nailing the creative in a way that is real and raw should be priority number one for advertisers on TikTok.

Powered by a dynamic algorithm that quickly gauges individual user preferences and then curates a highly personalized “For You” page (FYP), TikTok doesn’t have its users tell the platform what they want to see—rather, it tells them. And the internet, and advertisers, seemingly can’t get enough. The app is continually developing and implementing ad capabilities and features, yet there is already much for media buyers to get excited about, particularly with TikTok’s next phase of ad growth enabling advertising both down the funnel and deeper into social commerce.

It’s not a channel without its troubles and controversies, though. From misinformation concerns (particularly election falsehoods) to privacy issues to brand safety to its politically-combustible ties with China, perhaps no other platform has rankled the powers that be in Washington (and elsewhere) quite so much.

Here, we explore the evolution of TikTok through a collection of stats and facts that we’ve curated just For You. We’ll cover the good and the not so good as we try to paint a picture of how (and why) it has become social media’s golden child. Let’s go.

TikTok’s meteoric rise in popularity 

It is, quite literally, a multi-billion-dollar question—just how did TikTok go from being a niche player just three years ago to the most popular app on the planet? The reality is there is no single answer, but instead a combination of factors: simple and easy-to-use video creation tools that blur the metaphorical line between creator and consumer; shrinking attention spans that pave the way for short-form video to thrive; a vast library of licensed music that allows users to easily enrich their clips with audio without fear of copyright infringement; and a community and collaborative feel within the platform (think hashtag challenges and Stitch). Its model is so successful, in fact, that it has frightened Meta and YouTube (and others) into disrupting their own business—Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts, anyone?

• TikTok’s ascent has been swift. It more than doubled its worldwide user base between 2019 and 2021 (291.4 million to 655.9 million), and by 2025, it is projected to have close to 1 billion users.
• The number of US monthly TikTok users is expected to reach 94 million this year, before rising again to 97.6 million next year and then surpassing 100 million in 2024.
• Time spent on TikTok is surging. US adults are currently spending roughly 46 minutes on the platform per day, a fraction ahead of YouTube and significantly more than Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit. (Also, if this forecast included teens, that number would likely be much, much higher).
• TikTok users watch 197.8 million hours of videos daily—approximately 11 times more than Instagram users watch Reels.
• In September 2022, TikTok was the most-downloaded app in the Google Play Store worldwide, generating almost 24 million downloads from Android users. Over on the Apple App Store, TikTok tallied approximately 7.5 million downloads, placing just behind social and photo app BeReal as the month’s most-downloaded app.
• 73% of consumers feel a deeper connection to brands they interact with on TikTok compared to others, with 67% saying that TikTok inspired them to shop even when they weren’t looking to do so. 

The TikTok effect on marketing and advertising  

“Don’t make ads, make TikToks.”

That was the invitation TikTok laid out for advertisers when it opened its brand-facing wing back in 2020. And with the company’s revenues skyrocketing, it appears that challenge has been gleefully accepted. TikTok’s ad business made its first foray into performance marketing with lead-generation ads that empower brands to collect information from prospective consumers through forms and contests. Since then, TikTok has been busy significantly expanding upon those offerings, rolling out formats like interactive add-ons, search ads, and collection ads that together look set to play a fundamental part in the app’s monetization strategy.

• US TikTok ad revenues are projected to edge past $5 billion in 2022 (representing 139.9% growth from 2021) and are estimated to reach $6.83 billion in 2023 and $8.62 billion in 2024.
  • Accordingly, US TikTok ad revenues per user have increased 121.6% this year to $53.42—a number that is forecast to rise again in 2023, hitting $70.00.
• This year, TikTok will make up 2.0% of the total US digital ad market, 1.5% of the total media ad market, and 7.7% of the total social network market. These shares are predicted to grow steadily over the next two years, reaching 2.8%, 2.1%, and 10.9% respectively in 2024.
• Based on engagement rate per follower, higher education institutions (9.9%), sports teams (7.6%), and nonprofits (6.4%) represent the top-performing industries on TikTok. Home décor (2.1%) and health and beauty (2.0%) ranked lowest on the lists.
• Ad spending by DTC brands on TikTok has surged 231% over the past year, hitting $30 million in Q2 of 2022—the highest growth among major online platforms including Facebook, Snapchat, and Google.
  • Interestingly, it’s not the big spenders that are behind this ad spend, but rather the stores with $1 to $5 million annual revenue. So while Meta may be thrashing Apple about damaging small businesses with its iOS privacy policies, it may just be that those advertisers are moving their ad dollars from Facebook to TikTok.
• In Q3 of this year, TikTokers spent more than $900 million inside the app—the highest quarterly in-app spending for any app in history.
• The number of social buyers on the app will increase 72.3% this year to 23.7 million before rising another 40.6% to 33.3 million in 2023. 

TikTok and the highly coveted Gen Z audience

TikTok has disrupted how an entire generation connects, shops, entertains and educates itself, and ultimately perceives the world. To understand why TikTok is so popular with Gen Z is to understand their inherent characteristics. Research shows that one of the defining features of today’s youth is an expression of “individual truth”. They are also the first generation of online natives—well-acquainted with digital advertising tactics and therefore naturally drawn to fresh ideas and creative storytelling (for example, unfiltered videos!). The fact that TikTok facilitates self-expression and celebrates authenticity plays right into their hands. In other words, TikTok and Gen Z were made for one another.

• Gen Z represents 44.4% of total TikTok users in the US with millennials accounting for 35.0%, Gen X for 13.2%, and baby boomers for 4.8%. The share of Gen Z users will gradually increase over the next two years, reaching 48.4% in 2024.
• 61.3% of US Zoomers use TikTok at least once per month, compared to 44.8% of millennials, 19.0% of Gen X, and 6.5% of baby boomers. The app’s penetration among Gen Z is expected to hit 70.4% by 2026.
  • In terms of actual users, there are currently 41.8 million active US Gen Zers on TikTok—a number that could hit 49.3 million by 2026.
• Drilling down by age, the three largest user segments are 25- to 34-year-olds (23.7 million), 18-24 year-olds (22.5 million), and 12-17 year-olds (16.6 million). It’s no surprise that these are the exact demographics where Facebook is seeing its biggest exodus. 

TikTok’s appeal goes beyond short-form video

For a long time now, TikTok has been the elephant in its competitors’ boardrooms—and on their increasingly disappointing earnings calls. The app’s recent advances in ad technology, measurement capabilities, and expansion into the digital marketing ecosystem (for instance, through music streaming and mobile gaming) indicate that TikTok is not content to simply sit in the realm of short-form video. The platform is already siphoning ad dollars away from Meta, but the diversification of its portfolio could soon pit TikTok against the likes of Spotify, Apple, Amazon, and Google as it transforms into a public square for news and conversation.

• Three-quarters of TikTok’s US users discover new music artists on the platform and 63% found new music they had not heard elsewhere.
• The app’s role as a news source is climbing—currently, one-third of TikTok users say they regularly get news on the site, up from 22% who said the same in 2020. TikTok users remain far less likely than users of Twitter or Facebook to get news on the site, but it is the only channel trending upward in this area.
• TikTokers are increasingly using the app as a visual search tool: 40% of Gen Z open TikTok or Instagram, not Google, when searching for nearby lunch spots. It’s conceivable that, given time, TikTok could start pulling more mid-funnel queries away from the search giant.

TikTok is not immune to controversy

While the industry’s excitement around TikTok is palpable, advertisers would be wise to consider some serious issues with the platform, particularly when it comes to misinformation. It must be noted that this isn’t a problem exclusive to TikTok. Even as social media companies have increasingly clamped down on written posts, they’ve still yet to get a handle on short-form video—representing a potentially harmful and unsafe situation for consumers. Then you have troubles that are unique to TikTok, including concerns that its algorithm can drive unhealthy, even downright dangerous, trends to go viral before they can be vetted for safety. And we won’t even get into the US government’s concerns surrounding its affiliations with Beijing-based parent company ByteDance. All in all, TikTok is not immune to controversy.

• TikTok approved 90% of advertisements featuring election misinformation submitted by researchers in the run-up to the 2022 US midterms, including ads featuring the wrong election date, false claims about voting requirements, and rhetoric dissuading people from voting.
  • TikTok also removed 350,000 videos related to election misinformation in the latter half of 2020 and blocked 441,000 videos containing misinformation from user feeds globally during that US Presidential Election year.
• One investigation found that new accounts that do nothing but scroll the app’s algorithmically curated For You Page watching videos about the war in Ukraine would be funneled towards false or misleading content within 40 minutes.
• For its part, TikTok says it has more than a dozen accredited fact-checking partners around the world reviewing content in over 30 languages.

TikTok by the Numbers—Wrapping Up

TikTok has become a digital advertising powerhouse seemingly overnight. Its consumer appeal and high engagement rates across numerous verticals make it a worthy option for ad spending at a time of economic upheaval. But as a new(ish) channel, figuring out just where it fits into the digital media mix and how much budget should be dedicated to the platform remains a significant challenge for brands.

One thing is for sure, though: there are great rewards available to those that get it right.

Want to learn more about how to approach TikTok advertising? Check out our blog post, The Do’s and Don’ts of TikTok Marketing to get all the tips and tricks you need to succeed. Or, if you’re looking for more general advice about your media campaigns yet don’t know where to begin, our Media Strategy & Activation team can point you in the right direction.