TikTok’s Instagram competitor, Whee, struggles to gain traction

TikTok’s new platform, Whee, designed to compete with Instagram, is facing difficulties in gaining traction among users. Despite its innovative approach and potential to disrupt the social media landscape, Whee has not yet managed to attract a significant user base. The struggle highlights the challenges of entering a market dominated by well-established platforms, where even a giant like TikTok can find it tough to draw users away from their preferred apps.

Boston Brand Media brings you the latest news - TikTok recently launched a new social app named Whee, resembling Instagram in its photo-sharing functionality with friends. Similar to Instagram, Whee offers photo filters and messaging features. However, the company's strategy for Whee remains unclear as the app has low download numbers and hasn't been promoted through Apple's Search Ads, according to data from Appfigures.

Without marketing support, new apps tend to remain unnoticed in today's App Store. This seems true for Whee, which was quietly released on June 18 across 71 countries. Due to the lack of promotion, Whee did not enter the Top Free Apps chart on Apple's App Store or become one of the Top 500 Social apps in its markets initially, though this status changed later on.

Whee is connected to TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, but is published by TikTok itself, not ByteDance, according to its App Store listing.

As of Tuesday, Whee had only accumulated 13,000 total global downloads on iOS and over 10,000 downloads on Android, based on Google Play data. The app is not currently being promoted in the U.S., with its top iOS markets being Malaysia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Peru, and Indonesia, though these countries contribute only a small number of downloads.

For example, Malaysia, the top market, provided 2,400 downloads, while Indonesia, in fifth place, had just 800 installs. Given the small numbers, these are likely from users who stumbled upon Whee while searching the App Store. In smaller markets with fewer apps, Whee reached the Top 500 Social apps, but rarely made it into the Top 10 and usually ranked well beyond 50.

Appfigures reports that ByteDance has not yet advertised Whee via Apple’s Search Ads, which help apps rank highly in App Store searches using specific keywords. There has been no Apple Search Ads activity for Whee so far. User feedback from those who have found Whee is lukewarm, with an overall rating of 3.6 out of 5 globally, based on 31 App Store ratings, of which only 10 include reviews.

Boston Brand Media also found that, ByteDance has not commented on its plans for Whee, but the app's launch timing is notable, as President Biden signed the TikTok ban into law in late April after the House passed a revised bill mandating either a TikTok ban or sale. TikTok has sued the U.S. to block the law, delaying the ban while the courts address its legality.

Whee’s introduction could be a contingency plan for ByteDance to maintain a social media presence in the U.S. if TikTok's ban is enforced.

This isn’t ByteDance's first attempt to spark interest in social apps outside of TikTok. Earlier in 2023, the company launched Lemon8, another Instagram-like app, in the U.S. and U.K., even paying TikTok influencers to promote it. By November 2023, Lemon8’s U.S. downloads on iOS had reached 2.5 million, which, while impressive for a new app, is far below TikTok’s over a billion monthly active users, including 170 million in the U.S. However, Lemon8 may be a slow-growth app, as it is now the No. 2 Lifestyle app in the U.S., with nearly 7.7 million iOS installs.

ByteDance also operates the popular video app CapCut, often used for creating TikTok videos, and briefly ventured with a BeReal rival, TikTok Now, which was shut down within a year. Currently, it is testing another Instagram competitor, TikTok Notes.

Whether Whee will follow the same strategy as Lemon8 is yet to be determined. But if you notice your favorite TikTok influencer talking about Whee in the future, they were likely paid to do so.

For questions or comments write to writers@bostonbrandmedia.com

Source: Techcrunch‍