DEEP DIVE

TikTok released its year-end wrap-up on Monday, which included lists of the top trends, memes, and creators on the app in 2019. Known as TikTok’s Top 100, this overview solidifies the app’s role as an influential platform when it comes to music, pop culture, and communication. The Top 1oo includes the top ten videos or creators in each of ten categories: viral videos, memes, artists, celebrities, breakout creators, dance trends, creative effects, animal videos, beauty and style videos, and sports highlights. TikTok didn’t specify if the “top” videos were chosen based on numbers of views, like counts, or other metrics.

This recap reviews some of TikTok’s most iconic moments and memes of the past year including the role it played in Little Nas X’s rise to the top of the charts with the use of “Old Town Road” in the Yee Haw Challenge. Memorable memes include VSCO girls, Area 51, I’m Baby, Walk A Mile, DNA Test, and #TikTokCheks. The top ten viral videos list features a massive Elephant Toothpaste experiment, “here’s the MF tea,” Kombucha Girl’s iconic reaction, the Mr. Sandman cat,  and “they did surgery on a banana.” This past year, popular dance moves like The Woah, The Git Up, 223’s, and the #Obsessed challenge rocked TikTok.

TikTok stars of the past year include already known internet celebrities like David Dobrik, James Charles, and former Viner Zach King, mainstream celebrities like Will Smith and Miley Cyrus, and stars who rose to fame on TikTok such as Noen Eubanks and Charli D’Amelio.

The scope of TikTok’s influence is evident in Google’s “Year In Search” data covering the top searches in the United States during 2019. eBoy and eGirl style were among the top style-related searches and “eGirl outfit,” “eBoy outfit,” “soft girl outfit” and “VSCO girl outfit” were in the top five outfit idea searches. “What is a VSCO girl” was Google’s #3 most searched for “what is” question.

In its third year running, TikTok has made headlines for its controversial policies, relevance in pop culture, and rapid growth. The Top 100 breaks down some of the ways that TikTok makes content go viral including special effects, hit songs, replicable dance moves, relatable memes, and creators that present a smorgasbord of video types.