Save your TikTok data before it gets banned in the US

Honestly, I’ve been crying my eyes out this week when I think about losing TikTok. Surely there is more Real life The people I interact with on Meta platforms because of the legacy of those social networks; I’ve had Facebook since college, Instagram because it was iOS only, and I switched from Android to an iPhone 4S one summer because I wanted access to that app. WhatsApp allows me to stay in touch with anyone from anywhere else in the world. But TikTok is a community I visit when I have time to lock in the algorithm.

TikTok is how I stayed connected to international communities when I couldn’t be there in person, on continents I don’t know if I’ll ever have the opportunity to visit. It’s where I was adopted by Gen Z when I became hyper-focused on Ghost Klein. This is where I started piecing together the reasons why people thought I had ADHD for so long, and everything I learned on TikTok told me enough to go to my doctor and say, “I guess this is what happens after all.” During the latter Forest fire disasterwhich takes place in the southern half of my home state, TikTok allows me to monitor affected communities and where I can donate money and supplies to help victims.

Dear reader, I am sad. I haven’t quite accepted that TikTok is going the way of the dodo — in the US, as it did in Russia a few years ago — and I still log in and hope for a miracle. But I also face the fact that I have no idea what will happen in the future January 19. So, as is the case every time a company announces the debut of their website or social network, I will do my best to back up my data on TikTok. And we will all do it together now.

How to backup your data on TikTok

A few nights ago, I looked into my TikTok account settings to see if I could download my data. It seems the only way to do this is through the mobile app, as I can’t reproduce this next set of instructions on the web app. In the TikTok app, go to your profile page and tap the button to show the page Settings and privacy Menu. Click there, then choose account. Scroll down to where it says you can Download your data.

You must request a dump of your data before you can download it. This process takes a few hours, and TikTok will offer a TXT or JSON file of your data for download from the same window. The package is available for four days from the time you order it.

I downloaded my data in both formats. A lot of things are exported, like the names of accounts I follow, which will help me find them elsewhere, comments I’ve left on other people’s pages, and direct messages. Embarrassingly, TikTok also kept data about my shopping habits on TikTok and the number of coupons I missed using.

I don’t know what to do with the JSON file. Lifehacker It is suggested to use the file with third-party applications to extract specific data and export it elsewhere. there Github helper You can play around with that and it will take a JSON file and export the videos as per your choice. But it all flies over my head when I try to multitask the other five things I’m supposed to be doing.

If you’re like me and prefer to pay to ensure all your personal TikTok videos are downloaded locally, you can use a service like TalkBackup To do this act. The minimum transaction is $5 per month to get up to 6,000 of these videos, after a full check of your account. TokBackup is still scanning my profile, so I can’t yet report on how effective it is at saving videos. The popular consensus seems to be that the easiest way to back up TikTok videos you’ve posted is to save them one by one individually. I hope TokBackup works because I don’t have time this week!

Let’s say you want to save all your favorite TikTok videos before the app gets obliterated, like Alderaan in Star Wars: A New Hope. This stylish Chrome extension It will do this for you in the background. I have about 650 videos that need to be downloaded, but I only got to 145 before I closed the screen to pause it. After we’re done chatting here, I’ll go back to saving every TikTok video I liked.

Where do you go next?

I think people will do that rednote To find their community in the Chinese version of TikTok. I haven’t jumped ship quite yet, but that’s because I’m not too attracted to the idea of ​​translating every conversation between English and Mandarin. Other people are simply giving up on using Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts, although no one has jumped ship yet. The community is still hoping for a last-minute agenda change before the platform is abandoned.

The TikTok alternatives that have emerged recently are so new that it’s hard to know if they will offer the same magic that TikTok did. Applications such as byte And lemon 8(Android, iOS), which is owned by Tiktok’s parent company, may be places to try if Meta platforms are no longer your thing. There too Traileralthough I’m reticent to suggest you go there because it’s where TikTok haters congregate Since 2020.