Musical.ly was a social media platform that allowed users to create, share and discover short music videos. The app was released in 2014 and quickly gained popularity among people who love music and making lip-sync videos. It had over 200 million active users who used the app to showcase their talent by performing covers of popular songs, recording skits, and creating comedic videos.
The app’s success caught the attention of Chinese company ByteDance, which acquired Musical.ly in November 2017 for $1 billion. ByteDance then merged Musical.ly with its own TikTok app, which had been released in 2016. The combined apps created an even bigger platform where users could create, share and discover short-form videos.
The two apps were merged in August 2018 when the name Musical.ly disappeared from the App Store and Google Play Store, replaced by a new logo featuring the words “TikTok” on a pink background.
The change was seen as an opportunity for TikTok to become even more popular by taking advantage of Musical.ly’s already large user base. By merging both apps into one, they were able to offer more features than either app could on its own.
For example, users of both apps can now access more music options for their lip-sync videos as well as a variety of special effects and editing tools that weren’t available before. TikTok also added live streaming capabilities which allow users to broadcast their videos in real-time to their followers.
The merger has also increased TikTok’s reach by allowing it to be downloaded in more countries around the world than either Musical.ly or TikTok could have done alone.
Conclusion:
The merger between Musical.ly and TikTok offered many benefits for both companies and their users alike; primarily allowing them to benefit from each other’s user base while offering a larger selection of features and capabilities than either could have provided on its own. This has made TikTok one of the most popular social media platforms today with over 800 million active monthly users across the globe.