TikTok has exploded in popularity over the last few years, becoming one of the most widely used social media platforms globally. According to recent statistics, TikTok had over 1.5 billion monthly active users as of 2023, making it one of the fastest growing apps in history (Source). With its unrivaled growth and massive user base composed primarily of Gen Z users, TikTok has revolutionized short-form video content and changed the social media landscape.
Yet despite its meteoric rise and huge community of content creators and viewers, TikTok lacks one key feature found on almost every other major social platform – a search button. This omission is more than just an inconvenience for users though. It represents a core part of TikTok’s strategy and user experience.
Brief History of TikTok
TikTok started out as the app musical.ly, which was launched in 2014 by Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang. Musical.ly was a social media app that allowed users to create and share short lip-sync, comedy, and talent videos set to music and audio clips.
In 2017, musical.ly was acquired by the Beijing-based internet technology company ByteDance for $1 billion. ByteDance operated the hugely popular social media platform Douyin in China, which had similar functionality to musical.ly.
In August 2018, ByteDance merged musical.ly into its Douyin app, rebranding and launching it internationally as TikTok. TikTok retained all of musical.ly’s features and user base. Under ByteDance, TikTok’s growth skyrocketed globally thanks to its algorithmic recommendation system and expanded feature set beyond just music videos.
Today, TikTok has over 1 billion monthly active users worldwide and has become one of the most popular social media platforms and influential apps. The app is especially popular with Gen Z, owing to its short-form viral video content.
TikTok’s Focus on Short Video
Since its inception, TikTok has focused on short-form vertical video content. Most videos on TikTok are very brief, lasting from a few seconds to a maximum of 3 minutes
According to a 2023 study by Statista, the majority of top performing TikTok videos with over 1 million views are between 30 seconds and 1 minute long [1]. This shows users clearly favor quickly digestible content.
TikTok’s format lends itself well to short videos that capture viewers’ attention rapidly. The short time constraints require creators to get right to the point and use editing techniques like quick cuts, text overlays, and effects to convey a lot of information and entertainment value in a compact package.
For You Page Algorithm
One of the key reasons TikTok does not have a search button is due to its powerful For You Page (FYP) algorithm. The FYP is the main feed that users see when they open TikTok. It is fully personalized for each user based on their interests, interactions, location, device, and more (Apps UK).
TikTok’s AI algorithm analyzes user data and activity to determine which videos will be most engaging to each specific user. It then populates the FYP with content it believes each user will enjoy and keep watching. This creates an endless stream of tailored video content (Boosted).
The FYP algorithm is central to the TikTok experience. Adding search could disrupt the personalized feeds that TikTok has designed for each user.
Search Doesn’t Fit the Platform
TikTok was designed for passive watching and scrolling, not active searching (I Can’t Search On TikTok (Help!)). The platform’s main feature is the For You page, which uses an algorithm to deliver an endless stream of short videos tailored to each user’s interests and engagement. TikTok wants users to lean back and be entertained by the algorithmic recommendations, not lean forward and actively hunt for specific content.
Adding a prominent search bar would disrupt this passive viewing experience. TikTok is concerned that giving users an easy way to search videos may lead them to go down intentional “rabbit holes” and divert their attention away from the algorithmic feed. The lack of search puts more emphasis on the For You page and creates a more addictive, autoplaying experience.
Search Could Disrupt the Algorithm
One of the primary reasons TikTok does not have a search feature is that it could undermine or disrupt its AI recommendation algorithm known as the “For You” page (AI search and recommendation algorithms). This algorithm is designed to provide each user with a unique, personalized feed of short videos based on their interests and engagement. The goal is to keep users endlessly entertained by the algorithm’s suggestions.
Adding a search feature could circumvent this algorithm by allowing users to simply look up specific content, rather than relying on the algorithm’s picks. This could reduce the amount of time users spend passively watching the recommended videos, since they can directly find what they are looking for. While some users would welcome a search feature, it goes against TikTok’s core design which aims to keep people engaged through AI recommendations versus active searching.
Overall, search is at odds with the “For You” algorithm which is central to TikTok’s success and engagements. While the company is experimenting with ways to integrate search, it will likely be in a limited capacity to avoid undermining the algorithm that makes TikTok addictively entertaining for millions of users.
Keywords and Sounds Act Like Search
Even though TikTok lacks a designated search bar, keywords and sounds allow users to discover new videos and accounts related to their interests. Hashtags operate similarly to search on other platforms – adding a hashtag to a video allows it to appear in results for that hashtag. Viral sounds also act as a discovery mechanism, with users able to click on a sound used in a video to see other videos utilizing the same sound. TikTok recommends hashtags and sounds based on a user’s interests and interactions, further enabling discovery. According to SnowAngel, “TikTok hashtags trends also have their ups and downs. So you need to check whether” a hashtag is currently popular when deciding what to include (source). Hashtags and sounds provide a “search-like” functionality that allows users to find new accounts and content catered to their tastes.
Third-Party Search Tools Exist
While TikTok doesn’t have a built-in search feature, some third-party companies have created browser extensions and websites that allow users to search TikTok content. One of the most popular is TokSearch, which is a browser extension available for Chrome and Firefox. TokSearch lets users search for videos, hashtags, sounds, and creators on TikTok.
Other third-party search tools include TikTok Search and TikTokPal. These tools all function similarly by allowing keyword searches within TikTok. They provide an alternative search method since TikTok itself lacks a native search bar. While limited compared to a full internal search engine, third-party extensions do give users some basic search capabilities on TikTok.
TikTok is Testing Search Features
While TikTok has avoided implementing a full search feature thus far, the platform has begun limited trials of search capabilities in select countries. According to sources like SearchEngineLand, TikTok has tested displaying links to Google search results from its internal search bar. When users type a search query, they may see a link prompting them to “Search on Google” for additional results.
This integration indicates TikTok is cautiously exploring ways to bridge the gap between its platform and broader search engines. While not launching a full internal search engine, connecting searches to Google provides users an avenue to find more content and information. However, these integrations have been small tests rather than full rollouts of search for all users.
According to reports, TikTok’s searches linking out to Google have been spotted in the UK, Canada and other countries, but are not available globally. This suggests the company is still in the early phases of exploring how search could work on its platform. While major changes are unlikely in the immediate future, TikTok’s small scale tests provide a sneak peek at how search could evolve on the app over time.
The Future of Search on TikTok
While TikTok has begun testing search features, search is unlikely to become a prominent part of the platform. TikTok’s success has been built on its algorithmic For You page that delivers an endless stream of short videos tailored to each user (TikTok Help Center). Adding extensive search capabilities could disrupt this core algorithmic experience.
However, TikTok may continue to expand limited search functionality. This could include enhancements like searching by keywords in captions (TechCrunch). The goal would be minor search improvements without compromising the addictive For You page that has driven TikTok’s meteoric growth.
