For months, Instagram has been watching and waiting to see what would happen to TikTok's rival under a new federal law that would ban the app in the United States. On Sunday, the day the law took effect, Instagram collapsed.
The Meta-owned social media app announced a new app called Edits, a video editing product that appeared to be a clone of CapCut, which is used by millions of people to stitch together short videos for TikTok. CapCut and TikTok are owned by ByteDance, the Chinese internet giant, which led to US investigations into the apps on national security grounds.
“There's a lot going on in the world right now,” Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, said in a post on the platform on Sunday. “No matter what happens, we think it's our job to make the most compelling creative tools for those of you who make videos.”
TikTok and its sister apps, CapCut and Lemon8, have long been giving American social media apps a run for their money. TikTok has 170 million U.S. users and has said in legal filings that it cannot afford to go public even temporarily because it would be at a competitive disadvantage in one of its largest markets.
Late Saturday, hours before the federal law banning TikTok was set to take effect, TikTok, CapCut and Lemon8 were no longer available, although TikTok came back to life on Sunday when President-elect Donald J. Trump said he planned to launch a to issue an executive order. to lift the ban.
TikTok's competitors didn't wait to take advantage of the situation. Mr. Mosseri described Edits as specifically designed for creators to edit videos on their phones and save ideas for other videos they might want to post later.
Mr Mosseri said creators could use Edits to work on videos and post them to any platform they want, not just Instagram. Influencers often used CapCut to work on videos and post them to multiple platforms, including TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
Mr Mosseri said people could pre-order Edits from the Apple App Store from Sunday and the app would be available for Android in February.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has spoken publicly about seeing TikTok's dilemma. His Silicon Valley firm has hired lobbyists to argue that American tech companies should come first as part of winning the technology race against China.
During a meeting with employees last week, Meta's chief marketing officer also said the company needed to prepare for a possible migration of TikTok users to Meta's apps and dedicate staff and other resources to those possible developments. Instagram also changed its layout for some users last week, formatting content in a vertical, rectangular shape reminiscent of TikTok.
Instagram has long aimed to emulate TikTok's success. In 2020, Instagram launched Reels, an almost exact clone of TikTok's short video format. Reels has become one of the most popular features on Instagram and Facebook.
US internet users have said they would most likely watch Instagram Reels if TikTok were banned, according to a recent TD Cowen survey of 2,500 consumers. According to the survey, Reels would attract 29 percent of respondents, while 23 percent said they would spend more time on YouTube Shorts and 15 percent would look for a new app.
Among advertisers, Instagram's advantage seemed even greater: 56 percent of ad buyers told TD Cowen in a survey last quarter that their customers most wanted to advertise on Reels this year. Another 24 percent preferred YouTube Shorts, while 20 percent preferred TikTok.
Madison Malone Kircher contributed reporting from New York.
