If short-form video is the future of social media, TikTok is months, if not years, ahead of the competition.
Last year, U.S. TikTok users spent most of their time on the app (55%) watching content in the quick, attention-grabbing format, according to market intelligence firm Sensor Tower’s annual State of Mobile report for 2025. The rest of the time was divided between TikTok’s profile feed, chat function, live feature, search results, and other areas of the app.
Instagram came in a distant second place, with users dedicating 37% of their time on the platform to its Reels feature. YouTube Shorts, meanwhile, captured 26% of people’s time.
“TikTok is the clear leader among short-form video apps, and its success has prompted other social leaders to add their own short-form video features,” states a line from Sensor Tower’s report.
TikTok’s dominance in the space has no doubt helped it top Sensor Tower’s list of most downloaded social apps in the U.S. last year.
As TikTok’s future remains uncertain following President Donald Trump’s attempt to delay the app’s U.S. ban, rival platforms have been busy trying to attract TikTok’s 170 million users with bumps in ad spend and new features.
Last week, for example, Snapchat debuted an ad campaign with messaging that encourages viewers to “find their favorites on Snapchat.”
During the second half of 2024, Snapchat invested nearly $630,000 into advertising on national linear TV, according to figures from iSpot.tv, a television ad measurement and analytics company. During the second half of 2023, by contrast, Snapchat spent nothing on the medium.
In recent days, both X and Bluesky introduced dedicated feeds for vertical video. Substack unveiled a live video option for publishers.
Meta has also been trying to boost its presence in the short-form video market. Additional figures from Sensor Tower show U.S. Facebook users increased their share of time spent on Facebook Reels by 17 percentage points when comparing December 2024 with January 2024.
In the week leading up to the initial TikTok ban on January 19, Meta increased its digital U.S. ad spend by 30% compared to the week prior, per Sensor Tower.
