China’s famous short video app Douyin, also known as Tik Tok in countries outside of China, has had a strong social impact across the country, according to a 2018 big data report recently released by the app.

The mobile application, released only two years ago, has become a phenomenal video platform in China. By December 2018, the number of domestic daily active users exceeded 250 million, and monthly active users exceeded 500 million.

The report said that Douyin recorded a total of 260 million visits in 2018, and Beijing was the hottest city on the app, receiving 2.83 billion likes.

Multiple cities, including Xi’an, Chongqing and Nanjing have signed cooperation deals with Douyin for promotional content to aid tourism. Xi'an's total tourism revenue reached 4.5 billion yuan during the May Day holiday last year, a sharp increase of 139 percent year-on-year.

At the same time, Douyin has contributed to poverty alleviation. Thanks to the promotional activities held on the platform, impoverished county Daocheng in southwestern China’s Sichuan province received 700,000 tourists in the first half of 2018, a rise of 55 percent compared with the previous year.

Additionally, Douyin, which has a strong influence on the younger generation, is helping Chinese youngsters pick up traditional Chinese cultural activities. Statistics showed that videos of Chinese painting and calligraphy, as well as handicrafts and opera were among the most-watched clips.

By the end of December 2018, 5,724 government accounts and 1,334 media accounts had been opened on Douyin. People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, bagged 170 million likes last year.