Apple and Google restore TikTok to their US app stores

By Evans Momodu
2 minute digest
Updated 10:38 UK (GMT), Friday Feb 14, 2025 


Google Play said it restored TikTok to the US app store on Thursday, following promises by President Donald Trump to save the app and an executive action delaying the enactment of a ban on the wildly popular social media platform.

Bloomberg and CNBC also reported that Apple will restore the app to its app store on Thursday evening. TikTok was available on app stores as of Thursday evening. 

TikTok’s uncertain future stems from a law signed last April by then-President Joe Biden, which gave China’s ByteDance 270 days to sell the app to an owner from the United States or one of its allies or face a ban, based on US national security concerns. The day before the blackout, the Supreme Court upheld the ban.

TikTok shut down for roughly 14 hours in January but attributed its quick return to promises made by the then president-elect Donald Trump to keep the platform working in the US.

But its 175 million users still ran into at least one problem: The app was, as of that January weekend, unavailable on Apple and Google Play stores, along with Lemon8 and CapCut, which are also owned by TikTok’s China-based parent company, ByteDance.

Apple previously said in a statement, that it removed TikTok from the app store because of the ban, but the app remained available for customers who already downloaded it.

Having restored the app on Google play store and Apple store, users can continue to have fun while bearing in mind that the solution is only a transient one for now.
Source: CNN
Image: Bloomberg