TikTok has dethroned Google to become the world’s most visited website, new data has revealed.
Per The Independent, the viral video app ended the search engine’s dominance, which had seen it rank as the most popular domain for all of 2020 and the first part of 2021.
Google.com – which includes Docs, Calendar, Maps, Translate, Photos, Flights, News and more – was unable to compete with the budding social app, which now counts more than 1 billion active users around the world. TikTok.com also overtook Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Netflix — all of which ranked above it last year.
One of the more obvious reasons for users flocking to TikTok this year has been the Covid-19 pandemic, which has forced people to spend more time indoors and away from real-life social gatherings. These online browsing patterns continued even when lockdown restrictions came to an end, with “the summer of freedom” creating an opportunity for users to refresh and update their social media accounts.
See some of our favorite TikToks of 2021 below.