As TikTok’s global community of creators continues to grow, we know that some terms in reference to the app may be new and lost on others.

If terms such as ‘Duets’, ‘‘For You’ feed’ and ‘Digital Wellbeing’ raise more questions than provide answers, you’ve come to the right place! We’ve put together a handy glossary, to give you an overview of common TikTok terms and get you up to speed.

Come back here next week for Part 2 of our TikTok Glossary!

“Profile”

This is what you create about yourself that’s unique to you. To create a profile on TikTok, all you need is an email address or a phone number. You’ll also need to enter your date of birth. Your profile can be customised by adding a photo or a display name (this is separate to your user name) and it’s entirely up to you how much you want to personalise your profile.

“Community”

Our TikTok users build a community and come together to create, share, and inspire. This community is key to TikTok and it’s each user’s individual contribution that makes the platform special. We encourage and foster positive and respectful behaviour between our members. Our Community Guidelines are there for people to follow as well as to ensure trust and respect is maintained throughout the community. Harmful or dangerous content, violence, discrimination or hate speech, abuse or sexual activity, harassment or cyberbullying, and misleading content has no place in the TikTok community. TikTok advocates the safety of its users as well as respect for intellectual property.



“Creators”

TikTok users are known as creators because by contributing to shaping the immersive experiences of the community. Through the content they make and their experiences, they truly do create and that’s why we call them ‘creators’! They produce unique short videos which are special moments, experiences or impressions of the day, shared with the TikTok community. They show their creativity through music, dance, sports, funny sketches and more. The possibilities are endless.

“Fans”

If you are enthusiastic about the content of another user, you can become a ‘fan’ and follow their profile to make sure you don’t miss any of their activity!

“Hearts”

You can show your admiration for a video by clicking the heart on the right-hand side of the screen. Clicking the heart will auto-generate a collection within your own profile, collecting all of your favourite videos so you can view them later.

“Comments”

You can leave comments on other people’s videos. To also give our creators full control and to ensure these conversations remain constructive and inspiring, users can filter comments via keywords of their choice, or to disable them all together.



“Private Messaging”

With the Private Messaging function, you can talk to another user and privately exchange content. As with other parts of the app, you are in control over who gets to chat with you — and who doesn’t. View these permissions under the privacy and security settings.


Come back here next week for Part 2 of our TikTok Glossary!

For more information please visit our Safety Center.