In April 2020, the Chinese tech giant Bytedance, owner of TikTok, launched an app which was supposed to give Instagram a run for its money: Lemon8. The app was firstly launched in Japan, then reached the US market 2 years later, in February 2022. It can be described as a lifestyle platform similar to the extremely popular Chinese app Xiaohongshu (小红书), which offers a diverse range of content, mostly about fashion, food and travel. Since April 2023, the app has struggled to take off, especially in the US, which represented Lemon8’s third largest market.
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Lemon8 powerful algorithm and aesthetic were keys for its success
Lemon8 is a social media platform similar to Instagram, allowing users to create image carousels and explore various topics of interest. From sports to beauty routines and food recipes, it hosts a wide range of trending content. The app strategically attracts users by focusing on aesthetics. It provides free templates and editing tools, similar to TikTok’s ‘For You Page,’ to showcase well-designed posts that match users’ preferences, either set during profile creation or based on their liked posts. This ensures a constant stream of engaging content.
Another feature of Lemon8 is its powerful algorithm which rewards users for consistent post publishing. The more frequently a user posts, the higher their photos will appear on the “For You Page”. Furthermore, the app limits posts to a maximum of 10 hashtags, ensuring that photos are specific to the topic and only appear on the ‘For You Page’ of users interested in that theme.
The rise and fall of Lemon8
Lemon8’s lifestyle focus played a key role in its rapid popularity, particularly in East Asia. It was an attempt to replicate the success of China’s Xiaohongshu. After its official launch in Japan in early 2020, the app recorded more than one million downloads in a few months. Meanwhile in the US market, it achieved over 4.25 million users in March 2023, and ranked within the top 10 most downloaded apps in the country in the same period. However, the Bytedance-owned had already come under scrutiny from the US government due to escalating tensions between China and the US in August 2020. In the early months of 2023, the US government imposed strict limitations on TikTok, citing national security concerns and concerns about the handling of user data. Being part of the same company, Lemon8 also suffered the consequences of these decisions, and its daily active users almost halved from roughly 12,000 in March 2023 to nearly 6,000 in April of the same year, despite Bytedance unsuccessfully tried to relaunch the app on the US market.
The massive TikTok share won’t save Lemon8 from its crisis
Apart from the TikTok controversy, US users have also started to complain about Lemon8 content on the platform. Lifestyle apps, such as Instagram and Lemon8, face accusations of promoting an unrealistic portrayal of reality. Many posts are often criticized for appearing “too perfect”, leading to a declining interest among users.
The surge in ads on the Instagram-like platform is a growing concern for its business strategy as well. In February 2023, Lemon8 shifted its approach by compensating specific influencers exclusively for posting and advertising on social media to enhance user engagement. This change has led to some profiles being filled with ads, deviating from the platform’s original social focus.: Additionally, the app’s required those creators to follow detailed rules to get paid. Posts had to include high-quality, vertical photos, and captions spanning 100 to 300 words, blending information and engagement.
In contrast, platforms like Instagram offer creators more advertising flexibility avoiding the risk of submerging users with promotional posts. Despite the loss of popularity since April 2023, the app still is extremely popular on TikTok, where the hashtag #Lemon8 has more than 4.8 billion views as of September 2023. However, outside Bytedance’s ecosystem the situation isn’t as good: taking the Thai community as a reference point because it’s Lemon8’s most numerous user base, in other social media like Facebook and YouTube the official channels of the platform are having no popularity.
Lemon8 is struggling to keep up against rivals
Lemon8 couldn’t match Xiaohongshu’s popularity. At a first glance, the two apps seem identical, however, there are quite few elements which differ between the two platforms.
Both apps have targeted the Gen Z as their biggest consumer pool. However, while Lemon8 has a more equal gender distribution, consisting in 51% female users and 49% male users as of August 2023, Xiaohongshu’s female users accounted for 70% in the same period. Thus, most of the platform’s content is specifically designed for women, privileging fashion and beauty trends. Beyond the gender distribution, their actual user bases present a huge gap in size. Since its creation, the popularity of Lemon8 came to a fast end, going from an average base of 5 million MAUs in 2022, to 12,000 MAUs in March 2023, whereas Xiaohongshu had more than 174 million MAUs in the same period. Regarding their features, both apps are similar, offering a ‘For You’ section and allowing users to search for specific topics. Nevertheless, Lemon8 lacks the option to search posts and organize them based on the user’s current location.
Lemon8 vs Instagram: similar apps, different popularity
Despite many users have compared Instagram and Lemon8 for their evident similarities, there are also some differences with the Meta-owned platform. The most recognisable of them all is the size of their user base which, in the case of Instagram, has reached up to 2 billion MAUs for every month of 2023. Apart from the number of users, the two apps also differ in other features. Lemon8 places a stronger emphasis on image customization, offering users numerous downloadable templates during post creation. Additionally, in contrast to the TikTok-inspired ‘For You Page,’ Lemon8 provides a section where users can explore profiles of the most prominent creators, with their main topics of interest highlighted under their profile names.”
On the other hand, Instagram has more user-to-user interaction, with the possibility to send direct messages, videos, and make calls, features which are unavailable in Lemon8. Overall, the two apps are quite similar and have both positive and negative aspects: while Instagram is better at connecting users, Lemon8 gives more room to creativity and posts’ personalization, and it’s also easier to find creators and hashtags, because they have their own section.
Lemon8, a platform facing serious difficulties
- Lemon8 is a lifestyle app launched in 2020 in Japan and, two years later, in the US.
- The app is a combination of Instagram and TikTok: due to its powerful algorithm, users can have access to a detailed “For You” section, based on the content they like the most. Plus, Lemon8 presents also an extremely friendly user interface, offering an easy access to all the features it can offer.
- Despite having achieved a big number of subscriptions in the first months after its launch, the app struggled to maintain a solid user base. The TikTok process in March 2023 represented the most crucial moment in Lemon8’s crisis.
- The popularity of Lemon8 in other platforms different from TikTok is stagnating. Users are also starting to complain about the unrealistic representations of reality pictured in Lemon8 trends and the overwhelming presence of ads.
- Lemon8 is struggling to keep up the pace with every platform expected to be its competitor when it firstly was created. Instagram and Xiaohongshu are still too big to be challenged by the Bytedance-owned platform.
- Despite the apps seem quite similar, Lemon8 and Instagram have some elements they don’t have in common. While the first one offers a wider variety of photo editing and templates, the second one enhances more the connections between users.
