People Sign Up To Learn Mandarin on Duolingo Amid TikTok Ban

Duolingo is seeing a surge in new users because of people deciding to learn Mandarin, so they can better enjoy the Chinese equivalent of Instagram, RedNote (Xiaohongshu in Chinese).

Why It Hits: Politicians on both sides of the aisle regret having passed the divest-or-ban TikTok law, learning the hard way that a majority of Americans aren’t happy about it. The fact that millions of people are deciding to learn Mandarin and download more Chinese apps proves that people will choose entertainment over almost anything else (i.e., national security and data privacy).

Behind the Lessons: Duolingo’s infamously cheeky social account posted Monday: “Oh so NOW you’re learning Mandarin.”

It seems people really want to understand RedNote.

• RedNote’s default language is Mandarin, which isn’t a language most Americans know.
• But, boy, do they want to. Duolingo reported that Mandarin learning has skyrocketed 216% on the platform over the past year, with the biggest jump occurring this month.
• There was also a 36% increase in downloads, which means that many of the people learning Mandarin are new users.
• The biggest surge in usage and downloads happened at the same time that RedNote has picked up American users, making it top the Apple Charts — a major feat.

Final Test: In case you haven’t seen the (endless) headlines, TikTok says it’s going completely dark on Sunday when the ban takes effect. Now, there’s a mad scramble to save or buy it because… well… Pandora’s Box is already open. In the meantime, over 700,000 new users, mostly Americans, signed up for RedNote in a two-day period. 

Will RedNote really become the next TikTok? Unlikely. But it’s a stark message to the federal government that users are unhappy with the TikTok ban. How this all plays out is anyone’s guess.