“Sorry, TikTok is not available at this time,” the message read.
Hours before a federal law banning TikTok in the United States came into effect As of Sunday, the Chinese-owned social media app went dark and American users were no longer able to access videos on the platform. Instead, the app greeted them with a message saying “a law has been enacted banning TikTok.”
“We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us to find a solution,” the message said. “Please stay tuned!”
Additionally, TikTok's sister app, Lemon8, stopped working and showed US users a message saying it is “not available at this time.” Both TikTok and Lemon8 are owned by ByteDance, a Chinese internet giant.
Apple said it removed TikTok and other ByteDance apps, including Lemon8, from its app store, and users said Google's US app store also removed TikTok.
TikTok became unavailable after Friday's Supreme Court decision upholding the law, which requires ByteDance to sell the app by Sunday or face a ban. The law was overwhelmingly passed by Congress last year and signed by President Biden. TikTok, which has faced national security concerns over its ties to China, believed it could win its legal challenge to the law but failed.
The outage capped a chaotic period for TikTok, which had made last-minute pleas to both the Biden administration and President-elect Donald J. Trump to find a way out of the law. As of Saturday night, no one – including the US government – was completely sure what would happen when the law went into effect. The United States has never blocked an app used by tens of millions of Americans virtually overnight.
The law has a provision to penalize app store operators like Apple and Google and internet hosting companies like Oracle for distributing or maintaining the TikTok app. Under the law, these companies face penalties of up to $5,000 per user who can access the application.
TikTok, Apple and Oracle did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Google declined to comment.
For TikTok and ByteDance, the events are a hard blow. TikTok has approximately 170 million American users, who are some of the app's most lucrative customers. In legal filings, TikTok has said that even a temporary disappearance could ruin it, as users and creators would leave for other platforms and never return even if the ban were lifted.
The situation was further complicated because the law's start date fell in the final days of Biden's presidency. A White House spokeswoman suggested Saturday that the Biden administration would not begin fining companies on Sunday.
“We see no reason for TikTok or other companies to take action in the coming days before the Trump administration takes office on Monday,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement. “We have stated our position clearly and directly: the actions to implement this law will fall to the next administration.”
A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment after TikTok went offline. The Justice Department declined to comment.
Trump said Saturday that he would “most likely” find a way to give TikTok a 90-day extension once he takes office on Monday. The law gives the president the ability to extend the deadline for a sale only if there is “significant progress” toward a deal that would put TikTok in the hands of a non-Chinese owner. It was unclear how that extension might work if the ban had already taken effect.
Trump has also indicated that he could sign an executive order to bypass the ban on the app. TikTok CEO Shou Chew is expected to attend Trump's inauguration on Monday.
On Saturday, the mood on TikTok was somber. Alix Earle, a content creator with 7.2 million followers who rose to fame on the app in 2022He posted tearful videos lamenting the platform.
“I feel like I'm going through heartbreak,” Ms. Earle wrote in a video. “For me, this platform is more than an app or a job. I have so many memories here. I have posted every day for the last 6 years of my life. “I have shared my friends, my family, my relationships, my personal struggles and my secrets.”
Other users spent their final moments on the app recreating viral dances. The “For You” page was filled with montages of users' favorite trends and songs, many of which date back to the early days of the pandemic, when the app skyrocketed in popularity.
At 9 p.m. ET on Saturday night, TikTok was showing American users a pop-up message saying the app would soon stop working.
He said the law would “force us to make our services temporarily unavailable.” Shortly after, TikTok disappeared.
On Saturday night, Earle found solace by appearing on a rival social media platform: instagram.
“I just didn't expect this for this Saturday night,” he said of what happened on TikTok while live-streaming on instagram. RedNote, a Chinese video app that has become popular in recent days, will not become a long-term substitute, he said.
“We'll have to make it a little more fun here, that's what I'm thinking,” he said of instagram.
On Sunday morning in China, TikTok's notification to American users that it was suspending the service was a trending topic on Weibo, a popular x-like social media platform.
“This is a dark moment in the development of the Internet,” Hu Xijin, former editor-in-chief of the state-run Global Times newspaper, wrote on Weibo. The United States had set an example for “the entire Western world” by silencing voices online in the name of national security, he wrote.
Diao Daming, a professor of international relations at Renmin University of China, called TikTok “the first big test that Trump 2.0 must face.” Trump's actions on TikTok could test his relationship with “China hawks” in Washington, Diao wrote in a comment published on state media.
claire fu contributed reporting from Seoul. Nico Grant and Tripp Mickle contributed reporting from San Francisco. David McCabe contributed reporting from Washington.
