TikTok puts Facebook on notice with 1 billion downloads

Love it or hate it, TikTok is turning into a force to be reckoned with.

The video app, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has now been downloaded more than one billion times around the world, according to new data from app analytics company Sensor Tower.

The firm, which looked at installs across the various versions of the iOS and Android app, says the app gained more than 71 million new users during the month of January alone.

TikTok declined to comment on Sensor Tower's estimate, which does not include the Chinese version of the company's Android app. (The app has a sizable user base in China, where it's known as Douyin.)

Of course, app installs are a very different metric than monthly or daily active users, as not every person who downloads an app goes on to become a regular user. but the numbers underscore the meteoric growth TikTok has seen over the last year. The app is currently ranked #3 in Apple's App Store, just behind YouTube and Instagram.

Much of TikTok's recent growth stems from its merger with music video app Musical.ly, which ByteDance acquired in December 2017 in a deal reportedly valued at close to $1 billion. The merging of the two apps last year helped propel TikTok to become one of the most popular apps of 2018.

In a blog post, Sensor Tower founder Oliver Yeh noted much of the app's growth happened in 2018.

"Approximately 663 million of these installs occurred in 2018," he wrote. "To put this into perspective, the Facebook app was installed an estimated 711 million times last year and Instagram saw about 444 million new downloads."

Facebook and Instagram are still considerably larger -- with billions of monthly active users between the two apps -- but TikTok's massive growth is more than enough to get the company's attention.

Last November, Facebook released its own TikTok clone, called Lasso, in an effort to capitalize on the music video app's popularity. Lasso has yet to gain traction with Facebook's ever-elusive teen users, though. Snapchat also recently released a TikTok-esque "Lens Challenge" feature for lip sync videos.

Despite its massive popularity, TikTok has only just begun to make money off its legions of fans. The app currently lets people buy in-app gifts for live streamers, a feature that's taken in around $70 million to date, according to Sensor Tower's estimates. The app is also expected to begin expanding its advertising business.