TikTok

English

TikTok logo text

Etymology

From tick tock.

Proper noun

TikTok

1. A video-sharing social media platform.

Derived terms

• TikToker
• TikTokification
• TikTokky
• -Tok

 

Translations

app

• Armenian: ՏիկՏոկ (TikTok)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 抖音 (Dǒuyīn)

• Georgian: ტიკტოკი (ṭiḳṭoḳi)
• Hindi: टिकटॉक (ṭikṭŏk)
• Japanese: ティックトック (Tikkutokku)
• Korean: 틱톡 (Tiktok)
• Portuguese: TikTok, Tico e Teco (humorous, Internet, slang)
• Russian: ТикТо́к (ru) m (TikTók)
• Thai: ติ๊กต็อก
• Tigrinya: ቲክቶክ (tiktok)
• Vietnamese: TikTok (vi)

Noun

TikTok (plural TikToks)

1. (neologism, informal) A small video that can be viewed online, particularly one hosted on TikTok.

   How are these vaccine TikToks fooling so many people?

2. (informal) A TikTok account.
   • 2022, Brian Barcelona, Don’t Scroll: Evangelism in the Digital Age‎^[1], Grand Rapids, Mich.: Chosen Books, Baker Publishing Group, →ISBN:

     “Are there any volunteers who would like to make their first video in front of everybody?” The first person who raised his hand was a dad in his late forties who had been a participant in our training school. I remember this guy because earlier in the training he had told me that his son had told him, “Dad, whatever you do, don’t start a TikTok.”

   • 2022, Carol Pinchefsky, quoting Oriana Leckert, Turn Your Fandom into Cash: A Geeky Guide to Turn Your Passion into a Business (or at Least a Side Hustle)‎^[2], Newburyport, Mass.: Career Press, Red Wheel/Weiser, llc, →ISBN:

     If you’ve never been on TikTok, we don’t recommend you start a TikTok just to promote your campaign.

   • 2022, Stefanie Caponi, Guided Tarot for Teens: A Beginner’s Guide to Card Meanings, Spreads, and Trust in Your Intuition‎^[3], New York, N.Y.: Zeitgeist Young Adult, Penguin Random House LLC, →ISBN:

     Start a TikTok and share your ideas, join a club or group, or audition for the play, etc.

   • 2023, Claudia B. Manley with Abi Slone, Fashion Writing: A Primer‎^[4], Abingdon, Oxon, New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN:

     If you look at the podcasting sphere, which was a way of voices that had been pushed to the margins to carve out a space, now it’s just a content farm and one more space people have to participate in, like how brands have to have a TikTok, a presence in all these different mediums.

   • 2024, Hannah Trigwell, quoting Jack Conte, “Distributing Music Digitally”, in Making It Happen: How to Create a Sustainable Career in the Music Industry‎^[5], Abingdon, Oxon, New York, N.Y.: Focal Press, Routledge, →DOI, →ISBN:

     So, instead of just trusting that Spotify is always gonna do right by you, have a Spotify, have an Apple Music, Instagram, have a Facebook, have a TikTok, have a YouTube, have a merch site, have a Patreon.

   • 2024, Philippa Lawford, Cold Water‎^[6], Methuen Drama, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, →ISBN:

     We should start a TikTok for the drama department. […] We can do educational videos. Like, about the Poor Theatre, but with the dancing.

   • 2024, Sinclair Jayne, The Cowboy Charm (The Coyote Cowboys of Montana)‎^[7], Tule Publishing, →ISBN:

     We wanted some press so we started a TikTok and other social media.

Verb

TikTok (third-person singular simple present TikToks, present participle TikToking or TikTokking or TikTok-ing, simple past and past participle TikToked or TikTokked)

1. (neologism, transitive) To upload a video of something to TikTok.
   • 2019 November 29, Jonathan Heaf, “Confessions of a hypedad”, in ES Magazine, London, page 56, column 2:

     There’s nothing worse, after all, than male mutton dressed as lamb; or an old-style peacock dressed like a TikTok-ing Gen Z.

   • 2020 March 11, Wesley Morris, “Lil Nas X Is the King of the Crossover”, in The New York Times Magazine‎^[8]:

     He got up and performed the first verse, and then walked through the door of the rotating, dioramic set — part Michel Gondry music video; part high school musical — and: It was BTS! Off they went: this black American whiz kid and these seven South Korean superstars TikTokked together.

   • 2020 April 8, “Kauai mayor takes to TikTok”, in Honolulu Star-Advertiser, Honolulu, Hi., page A8, column 1:

     It’s not often that one sees a mayor TikTok-ing and Instagramming such random activities, ranging from ice-cream making, to exercising, to a mini magic show.

   • 2020 November 24, Libby Galvin, “Misinformation and fear is vaccine’s ticking time bomb”, in Evening Standard, London, page 7:

     Despite some unfortunate mixed messaging so far, government officials say they are well aware that there is an information war they need to win in order to beat Covid — and like these TikTok-ing doctors, they believe that social media is the key.

   • 2020 December 25, Melissa Ruggieri, “12 of the best songs of 2020”, in The Brownsville Herald, Brownsville, Tex., section “Banners, “Someone to You”, page B3, column 5:

     But thanks to pandemic-shuttered TikTok-ing teens, the anthem with an urgent pulse and message of longing for closeness reignited the Liverpool export’s profile.

2. (neologism, transitive) To search for and view on TikTok.

Quotations

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:TikTok.

Derived terms

• TikToker

See also

• Douyin