Users who have the TikTok app on their phone will still be able to access it after Jan. 19. However, because the ban would prevent Apple and Google from providing the app with necessary updates, TikTok would quickly break down and become unusable, leading Americans to look for an alternative app.

TikTok may be banned in the U.S. over the weekend, but Americans are heading to another Chinese-owned video platform: RedNote.

BEIJING (Reuters) -Chinese social media app RedNote has been thrust into the limelight after more than half a million TikTok users recently joined the platform in protest against a likely imminent ban on the short video app in the United States.

TikTok creators and users are facing the reality that the popular short-video app will likely be banned in the United States.

With five days left until the date by which TikTok is to be either sold or banned in the United States, millions of users are reckoning with what happens when one of the internet’s most important media platforms just up and disappears.

Americans are going to lose access to TikTok in less than a week, unless China green-lights a sale to what Congress has deemed a non-adversary of the United States — something China is unlikely to do but might.

Chinese officials are evaluating a potential option that involves Elon Musk acquiring the U.S. operations if TikTok fails to fend off a controversial ban.