Can you use TikTok in India? The short answer to this is that no you cannot as it is banned by both the Indian government, as well as TikTok itself.
The longe more nuanced answer is that in reality and like other countries with bans on websites there are ways around it. Not of course you know that we advocate them.
In case you are interested here is their announcement.
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The Great Firewall of India
Despite the tech hub type aura Internet freedom is not all that great in India, with it scoring 51/100. This makes it less free than Singapore or Japan, but mire free than Thailand, or Cambodia. Honestly this surprises me a bit as Cambodia don’t actually restrict that much.
Most of the 300+ sites blocked in India are Chinese, with it seemingly being more political than anything else. These include the aforementioned TikTok, WeChat and most of the Baidu family.
I won’t list the whole range of websites, but it goes a little something like this;
- 29 June 2020 – all 59 apps
- 27 July 2020 – all 47 clone apps
- 2 September 2020 – all 118 apps
- 24 November 2020 – all 43 apps
- 14 February 2022 – all 54 apps
- 2023 onwards – messaging, betting, and loan app bans
Click to read about the best apps in Georgia.
How to use TikTok in India?
If TikTok, or the Indian government find out you are using it in country you will be automatically kicked out of the app and most likely unable to get back in. If this happens it may take a long time to get back in even when you change country.
Therefore you could do the the following hypothetical things!
Turn off your location
Go into the app and turn the location sharing off. This is because even if you are using an eSim and, or VPN if it finds your are in India you will kicked off the app.
Use an e-sim in India
Regardless of which one you use, be it AirAlo or whatever, use an E-Sim rather than a local sim. These days prices are almost the same and it assumes you are not local. This might not last forever, as Russia just proved.
Use a VPN
Use a VPN is you want to use WiFi, like at all, This is because while your e-sim can mask that you are in India, WiFi knows exactly where you are. Therefore and while it does, or can make things slower it will give you double protection.
And that Pioneers is how TikTok in India works, if that is your thing of course.
Click to see our tours to India.
