TikTok Returns to Apple and Google App Stores Nearly 1 Month After Temporary Ban Forced Its Removal

Mar. 15, 2025

TikTok has been restored to the Apple and Google app stores.Photo:Getty

Getty

TikTok has returned to Apple and Google’s app stores nearly a month after they were removed.

The popular short-form video app returned to the app stores late on Thursday, Feb. 13, according to theAssociated PressandReuters.

Nearly four weeks prior, PresidentDonald Trumpsigned an executive order giving TikTok75 more daysbefore a law banning the social media platform in the U.S. would take effect.

The Justice Department recently promised in letters to Apple and Google that the companies would not face fines for offering the app in their stores,The New York Timesreported, citing two sources “with knowledge of the communications, who were not authorized to speak publicly.”

“I’m sure it can be extended, but let’s see,” he said, according toThe New York Times. “We have a lot of people interested in TikTok.”

Apple, Google and TikTok did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s requests for comment.

TikTok has been restored to the Apple and Google app stores.getty

The law required TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to either sell the app over fears China’s government could use its data to harm Americans or shut it down entirely. TikTok denied that information on the app would be shared with the Chinese government, calling it “outright censorship of the American people.”

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“It’s a strong stand for the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship,” the company added. “We will work with President Trump on a long-term solution that keeps TikTok in the United States.”

TikTok was banned on Jan. 18.Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images

But TikTok remained unavailable on Apple and Google’s app stores, preventing users from updating the app, until Thursday.

TikTok creator H. Lee Justine toldThe New York Timesthat the app’s executives expressed optimism about the app’s return to the stores during a call with creators on Tuesday, Feb. 11.

“They said that the administration had given them a lot of information that they wouldn’t be penalized and that they were really hopeful that any day now they would put it back in the app stores,” she recalled.

source: people.com