- TikTok faces a potential US ban if its owner, ByteDance, doesn’t find a buyer in about a week.
- TikTok allows users to download and save video content, but it can be tedious.
- Some competitors, like Triller, also offer ways to migrate TikTok content.
With a potential TikTok ban in the United States fast approaching, some social media users are looking for the best way to archive their content.
Congress passed a law last year that would limit the influence of social media apps tied to countries the United States deems foreign adversaries. The US then gave TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, which is Chinese, a January 19 deadline to find a buyer for the app in the United States or face a ban.
TikTok then challenged the law in court. On Friday, the Supreme Court heard arguments from TikTok and the Biden administration as it considered whether to delay the law’s effective date, which is now set for January 19.
Legal experts told Business Insider that they expect the Supreme Court will uphold the TikTok ban. “I expect the court to deny the stay, probably soon, and also uphold the law,” Matthew Schettenhelm, a litigation and policy analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, said.
During Friday’s hearing, lawyers for TikTok said the social media app could “go dark” and “essentially stop operating” in the United States if the court upholds the law.
If that’s the case, TikTok’s millions of users may be looking for a way to extract their content ahead of time. Here are a few options.
How to migrate TikTok videos
Triller, a media and marketing company that once positioned itself as a competitor to TikTok, unveiled this week a service that promises to “back up” all of a user’s TikTok videos and reupload them to the Triller app.
However, the feature’s process is not as easy as the “click of a button” that Triller promises, according to TechCrunch. Once users agree to the terms of service, they can connect their TikTok account to the website, which gives Triller access to videos, profile information, and more.
Triller sends users an email once all of their TikTok content has been downloaded. Then, users have to make a Triller account and follow instructions on uploading their TikTok content onto the Triller app.
How to save your TikTok videos manually
For users who want to avoid giving their personal information to yet another social media platform, the best way to save their TikTok content is likely already inside the app.
Though it is a more tedious process, TikTok allows users to download their content one video at a time from inside the platform.
Inside the TikTok app, you can go to any video you want to download, press the “Share” button, and tap “Save video” to download the video to your device. According to TikTok, if the “Save video” option does not appear, that means the person who posted the content does not allow video saves.
TikTok also allows you to save a copy of any content you post to your device while posting it to TikTok. Inside the “post” screen, you can tap the “more options” button and choose “save to device.”
TikTok also lets users download a copy of their entire profile data from inside the app. Inside the TikTok app, users can tap the “profile” button at the bottom of the screen, then tap the “menu” button at the top of the screen and navigate to “settings and privacy.” Users can then choose “Account” in the settings menu and tap “Download your data.”
