By some measures, TikTok has grown bigger than Facebook or Instagram in the US

There’s more at stake with Oracle’s potential control of TikTok’s US operations than national security and geopolitical harmony. The fate of some of America’s biggest social media companies, like Meta, Snap, Reddit, and Pinterest, also hangs in the balance.

And judging by the latest data from Similarweb, reported exclusively by Sherwood News, TikTok is in some respects more popular among Americans — a very lucrative social media demographic — than its competitors.

Meta doesn’t break out user numbers anymore for its individual properties, and TikTok, a company owned by privately held ByteDance, last disclosed that it had 170 million monthly US users in March 2024, so Sherwood asked Similarweb, a digital market intelligence company, for more recent estimates.

Since TikTok briefly went dark and then was resurrected early this year, the platform has pulled ahead of Instagram and Facebook as far as app monthly active users (MAUs) in the US. In August, TikTok had 183 million monthly active users on iOS and Android, according to Similarweb, up 16% from a year ago. That’s more than Pinterest and Snapchat combined.

TikTok’s daily active users (DAUs) grew 19% year over year to 102 million, just shy of Facebook’s 107 million daily users — a testament to how ingrained the older social network has become for some Americans over the years. Facebook leads TikTok by a small margin on desktop and mobile web as well, but the audiences there are smaller than in the apps.

The details of the spin-off are still being hammered out and a lot could change. But what’s certain is that there’s plenty of potential value to be found in TikTok’s American user base for those who own it.