TikTok is a popular social media platform that allows users to create and share short videos. However, TikTok also has community guidelines that users must follow. Violating these guidelines can result in strikes on your account. Strikes are warnings about violations of TikTok’s community guidelines. Getting multiple strikes can lead to temporary or permanent bans from the platform. This article provides an overview of TikTok strikes and community guideline violations.
What are Strikes?
Strikes are warnings issued to TikTok users for violating the platform’s community guidelines. When TikTok detects content that goes against its policies, it will remove the violating content and issue a strike to the account.
You can receive a strike for things like posting nudity or sexual content, hateful ideologies, harassment, dangerous acts or challenges, spam, or misleading content. The number and severity of strikes depends on the nature of the violation.
Strikes serve as a warning system for users. Having strikes on your account doesn’t immediately lead to suspension or banning in most cases. But accumulating multiple strikes does increase the risk of your account getting banned.
Types of Violations
TikTok issues strikes for violations of their Community Guidelines. Some of the major violations that can result in strikes include:
Illegal Activities: Content promoting criminal activities, drugs, weapons, violence, terrorism, etc.
Harmful Misinformation: Spreading false information about medical topics, elections, public health events, etc.
Hate Speech: Content promoting hate based on protected attributes like race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.
Harassment: Repeatedly targeting other users with unwanted attention, insults, threats, or abuse.
Privacy Violations: Sharing private information or media of someone without consent.
Dangerous Acts: Promoting dangerous challenges, stunts, or illegal activities that risk harm.
Spam/Scams: Posting repetitive content or running scams/fraudulent activities.
Intellectual Property Violations: Infringing copyrights, trademarks, or other IP rights.
Strike Impact
When you receive a strike on TikTok, it can impact your ability to engage on the platform in a variety of ways:
According to TikTok’s support page, if your account receives one strike, you will not be able to post, comment, or go live for 24 hours. With two strikes, you will be unable to post, comment, or go live for 7 days. Three strikes results in a 30 day suspension of posting, commenting, and live streaming privileges.
In addition to losing core account functionality, strikes may also prevent you from changing your username, bio, or profile photo during the suspension period. You also may not be able to appeal regular Community Guidelines violations while serving an active strike penalty.
Strikes only impact the specific account that committed violations. If you have multiple accounts, a strike on one account will not affect your other accounts. However, if you try to evade penalties by creating secondary accounts, TikTok may subject all associated accounts to enforcement.
Strike Duration
Yes, strikes on your TikTok account do expire after a certain period of time. According to TikTok’s Help Center, “Strikes on your TikTok account will expire after 90 days and will no longer be taken into consideration for a permanent ban” (source). So any strikes accrued on your account will be removed after 90 days.
This 90 day policy applies to strikes received for violations like minor safety, illegal activities, violent and graphic content, adult nudity and sexual activities, harassment and bullying, hateful behavior, dangerous individuals and organizations, regulated goods, misinformation, and more.
Copyright strikes also expire after 90 days according to TikTok (source). So you don’t have to worry about a single strike sticking on your account forever.
In summary, any strike against your TikTok account will automatically expire after 90 days. Keep your account violation free for that period and the strike will be removed from your record.
Avoiding Strikes
Here are some tips to help avoid getting strikes on your TikTok account:
Be mindful of TikTok’s Community Guidelines and don’t post any content that violates them. This includes nudity, illegal activities, hate speech, harassment, dangerous challenges, and more prohibited content.
If you use music, stick to songs from TikTok’s music library or that you have the rights to use. Unauthorized use of copyrighted music is a common reason for strikes.
Avoid reposting or duplicating viral videos too closely. While remixing ideas is encouraged, copied content is against the rules.
Be respectful in your videos and comments. Don’t attack, threaten or bully others.
Add captions or delete videos that are reported for issues like flashing lights, disturbing visuals or information.
Turn on Restricted Mode which limits mature content. If your video doesn’t comply with this, it may get a strike.
Appeal quickly if you get a strike, providing context on how you believe you followed the rules.
Appealing Strikes
If you receive a strike on TikTok that you believe was given in error, you can appeal the strike. According to TikTok’s support page, you can appeal a strike directly in the app by tapping the “Appeal” button in the violation notification or email (source). This will open an appeal form where you can provide details on why you believe the strike was unjust.
In the appeal form, be sure to give a clear explanation of why you think the strike should be removed. Provide any context or nuance that may not have been obvious to the content moderator. Politely request your account be reviewed again. TikTok recommends including links to the content in question in your appeal to make it easier for them to locate and re-evaluate (source).
Keep in mind appeals are reviewed by a human moderator, so an appropriate, respectful tone is recommended. Avoid aggressive or abusive language. Patience is also important, as it may take some time for your appeal to be processed. Continue to follow community guidelines moving forward. According to TikTok, accounts with multiple violations are less likely to have appeals approved (source).
Getting Strikes Removed
If you’ve received strikes on your TikTok account that have expired after 90 days, they will no longer count towards a permanent ban. However, the strikes will still be visible on your account. To get expired strikes fully removed from your profile, you need to submit an appeal to TikTok.
According to TikTok’s Community Guidelines, you can appeal expired strikes by tapping the appeal button on the violation in your profile. Provide an explanation of why you believe the violation should be overturned and removed. TikTok will review your appeal and decide whether to uphold or overturn the strike.
Users on Reddit have reported mixed success with getting expired strikes removed through appeals. Some users have had strikes overturned and removed after several appeal attempts over a period of months. Others have not had success getting expired strikes removed even after multiple appeals.a The process seems to require persistence and patience in submitting appeals.
While appealing, it’s recommended you continue following all Community Guidelines to avoid incurring any new violations on your account. Having no new violations for an extended period can help demonstrate your account is in good standing when appealing expired strikes.
Consequences
Multiple strikes on a TikTok account can lead to increased penalties and even permanent account bans. According to TikTok’s Community Guidelines, “There is a limit of 3 strikes for each IP type, then we’ll permanently remove the account.” 1 This means that if you get 3 strikes for copyright infringement, 3 strikes for harmful content, and 3 strikes for spam/scams, your account will be permanently banned.
The consequences for multiple strikes seem to escalate quickly. Reddit users report that just 2 strikes can lead to a 7-14 day ban, while 3 strikes often results in a permanent ban.2 So it’s important to be very careful about community guideline violations in order to avoid sudden account termination.
Overall, accumulating multiple strikes in a short period of time appears to be the fastest way to get your TikTok account banned. Each violation brings you one step closer to losing your account, so strive to create only original, high-quality content that follows all TikTok guidelines.
Conclusion
In summary, TikTok strikes do not technically “expire” or disappear from your account after a set period of time. However, minor violations like a single Community Guidelines strike will stop impacting your account after a certain period, usually 30 days. The violation and strike will still show on your account though.
While you can appeal strikes if you feel they were made in error, in most cases strikes are permanent. The only way to fully remove a strike is by appealing successfully and having TikTok delete it. Therefore, it’s important to be cautious and avoid behaviors that could lead to strikes in order to keep your account in good standing.
Understanding TikTok’s Community Guidelines and how the strike system works is key to maintaining your account status. While a single minor strike here or there may not permanently impact your account, accumulating multiple strikes can put your account at risk. Being thoughtful about the content you post and not intentionally violating policies is the best way to avoid issues.
