Earlier this month, TikTok released a new social app called Whee, an Instagram-like service that lets users take photos and share them with friends. Like Instagram, Whee supports the use of photo filters and has a messaging feature. But the company's plans for Whee are unclear, as the app has seen relatively few downloads and has not yet been promoted in Apple's search ads, according to new data from app intelligence firm Appfigures.
Without marketing support, new apps would remain largely invisible in today's App Store. Such is the case with Whee, which was quietly released in 71 countries around the world on June 18th. Due to the lack of promotion, Whee never made it onto Apple's App Store's top free app charts, nor did it immediately rank among the top 500 social apps in its supported markets, but that has since changed.
Whee is associated with TikTok, which is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, but is published by TikTok itself, not its parent company, according to its App Store listing.
As of Tuesday, Whee had just 13,000 downloads worldwide on iOS and just over 10,000 on Android, according to Google Play data. It hasn't had a clear push in the U.S. so far, with key markets on iOS including Malaysia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Peru and Indonesia. Even so, downloads from those countries are paltry.
For example, while the number one market, Malaysia, had 2,400 downloads, Indonesia only ranked 5th with 800 installs. With fewer downloads, these downloads are likely from people who stumbled across Whee while searching the App Store. In smaller markets with fewer apps, Whee ranked in the top 500 social apps, but not in the top 10, with most ranking well above 50.
Screenshot image credit: Appfigures
Moreover, according to Appfigures, ByteDance has not yet tried to promote Whee on Apple's Search Ads, a feature that allows apps to rank highly when App Store users search for apps using certain keywords. The company found that there is currently no Apple Search Ads activity related to Whee. Moreover, feedback from users who have found Whee has been pretty lukewarm, with the app receiving an overall rating of 3.6 out of 5 worldwide and 31 App Store ratings, of which only 10 have reviews.
ByteDance has not commented on its plans for Whee, but the timing of the app's release is notable given that President Biden formally signed the TikTok Ban Act in late April after the House of Representatives passed an amended bill that would have forced the ban or divestment of TikTok. (TikTok has since sued the U.S. to block the law from taking effect, which will likely delay the ban for a while, at least until the legality is resolved in the courts.)
Whee's arrival could be a Plan B of sorts that would allow ByteDance to maintain a social presence in the U.S. even if the TikTok ban remains in place.
This isn't the first time ByteDance has tried to drum up interest in social apps outside of TikTok. The company quietly launched another Instagram-like app, Lemon8, in the US and UK in early 2023, paying TikTok influencers to post about the app to seed initial content. These efforts didn't immediately bear fruit. As of November 2023, the app had only 2.5 million iOS downloads in the US. That's impressive for a startup, but far short of TikTok's scale of more than 1 billion monthly active users, including 170 million in the US. But Lemon8 may be an attempt at slow growth. Currently, the app is the second-largest lifestyle app in the US, with around 7.7 million iOS installs in the market.
ByteDance also operates CapCut, another popular video app often used to create TikTok videos. It also dabbled in BeReal rival TikTok Now but shut it down less than a year later, and is currently testing another Instagram rival called TikTok Notes.
It remains to be seen whether Whee follows the same strategy as Lemon8, but if your favorite TikTok influencers suddenly start talking about Whee in the future, keep in mind that the talk is probably being paid for.