Google Loses Most Popular Domain Spot To TikTok

Google loses its position as the world’s most popular domain. The search giant is reported to have lost this position to TikTok, according to rankings provided by web security company Cloudflare. The list of the most popular domains published by Cloudflare makes a part of its Year in Review report, the list showcases domains in various categories that have gained the most traffic from one year to the other.

In the previous year, according to Cloudflare’s rankings, the Year in Review report showcased Google.com — which also includes Maps, Translate, and News among other Google products as the domain which gained the most traffic. In that report, TikTok was ranked in 7th position. In this year’s report, TikTok.com is ending 2021 with a leap toward the top spot ahead of industry giants like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and other known world-leading domains.

Cloudflare had this to say about TikTok’s journey to earning the top position on the most popular domain on the year 2021 list: “It was on February 17, 2021, that TikTok got the top spot for a day. Back in March, TikTok got a few more days and also in May, but it was after August 10, 2021, that TikTok took the lead on most days. There were some days when Google was #1, but October and November were mostly TikTok’s days, including on Thanksgiving (November 25) and Black Friday (November 26).”A

Also included in the Year in Review report by Cloudflare’s are lists of the most popular e-commerce platforms, most popular social media domains, and most popular video streaming sites. It didn’t come as a surprise having Amazon top the list of the most popular e-commerce domain, followed by others like Taobao, eBay, and Walmart. Netflix, YouTube, and HBOMax were dominated by the list of most popular video streaming sites were, however, Twitch didn’t make it into the top 10 list.

With this discovery, does this mean TikTok has earned the place of the biggest social media site? Well, the answer is a big No. The social media domain still has a long way to go before reaching such heights. What this means is TikTok.com received a significant amount of traffic than any other domain, according to Cloudflare. It doesn’t in any way mean that TikTok has more users than Google or competing social media sites. However, chances that the social media platform can someday earn the place of the biggest social media site are highly possible, which also makes it a platform to look out for in the coming year, given it has continued to earn a top position on the list in various industry ranking this year alone. In September, TikTok reportedly overtakes YouTube in US average watch time. What this simply means is that TikTok’s users in the US now spend more time each month watching content than YouTube users, according to a report from app analytics firm App Annie. This reiterates the saying that the journey of a thousand steps starts with a step, TikTok has started taking these little steps and is not going to stop.

Insider Intelligence (formerly known as eMarketer) has also reported that TikTok surpassed Snapchat and Twitter in global user numbers, but the social media platform is well behind Facebook and Instagram. In other words, TikTok earned the position as the third-largest social media platform worldwide. In 2020, TikTok global users grew by 59.8% and an additional 40.8% in 2021. Further, Insider Intelligence estimates that TikTok will see a 15.1% growth in global users in the year 2022. Should that estimate hold true, TikTok will hold about 20% share of overall social media users by the end of next year. With all this said, if TikTok isn’t part of your social media marketing strategy for 2022, these numbers definitely present a good case for making it a priority.

Here’s the full list of the top 10 most popular domains according to Cloudflare:

1. TikTok.com
2. Google.com
3. Facebook.com
4. Microsoft.com
5. Apple.com
6. Amazon.com
7. Netflix.com
8. YouTube.com
9. Twitter.com
10. WhatsApp.com