After Meta’s fledgling attempt, TikTok takes on X by offering text-only posts

California, USA

After Meta, we have a new giant player entering the microblogging space—TikTok. To rival X (formerly Twitter) and Meta’s newly launched Threads, TikTok has declared it will offer text-only posts on its platform.

TikTok has embedded the new feature in its original app only, against Meta’s separate app. The Chinese company said in a statement that the text-only post option will expand the “boundaries of content creation” on the platform and tap into the “creativity seen in captions and comments”.

What is TikTok’s text-only post feature?

The service is similar to what Instagram already offers in 'Stories' feature. The users can generate posts using text on solid colour backgrounds, use music or sound, use stickers and location. Also, the ready-to-post content can be reposted as a video as well.

Watch: TikTok's attempts to reassure government

Due to TikTok’s massive popularity in the US (150 million users), the new feature is expected to disrupt the microblogging space. Its launch comes after Meta launched its Threads app and US billionaire Elon Musk rebranded his Twitter brand to X, thus further creating ripples on the internet.

Why TikTok is wading into the microblogging space

It started after Musk took over Twitter before rebranding it as X, and started implementing changes that ended up confusing and even irritating its users. The users have specifically expressed their frustration with the paid-only features and ‘view limits’ applied to unverified profiles.

Other major threats looming over X are diminishing valuation, major outages and plummeting revenues. However, none of them has led to a drop in X’s popularity among its users.

Also read: Turkey: 700,000 TikTok accounts were hacked ahead of presidential elections, says report

Subsequently, a couple of competitors garnered interest, such as Mastodon and the more recent Bluesky. 

Meta’s Threads: A flop show?

Meta's Threads, which was launched earlier this month, was perceived as the first significant contender to pose a real threat to Twitter. Threads boasts integration with Instagram and achieved unprecedented growth, attracting over 100 million users within a mere five days. 

However, its initial success was short-lived, witnessing a substantial 70 per cent decline in daily active users since reaching its peak on July 7. This setback has dampened its explosive launch, potentially paving the way for new competitors like TikTok to step in, introducing text features and presenting a formidable challenge to X (Twitter).