Forget about the come-and-go Threads, Xiaohongshu (a.k.a. RED, literally 小红书 Little Red Book, or just XHS) and Lemon8 are the most talked about social platforms in town – grabbing quality screen time away from the big boys, especially Meta.
How many times have you heard of “Oh! I saw this on XHS/Lemon8“? Perhaps, you have Chinese friends who have ditched Facebook for Xiaohongshu. TikTok is still popular but there are also many Malays who are active on Lemon8 now.
Let’s find out what are the differences between these two social platforms and how popular they are in Malaysia so read on!
XIAOHONGSHU MARKETING
Xiaohongshu vs Lemon8
In short, Xiaohongshu is like China’s Instagram with e-commerce features, while Lemon8 is arguably Bytedance’s response to Xiaohongshu. The feed’s layouts of both XHS and Lemon8 are 2-columns akin to Pinterest.
Originally launched as a platform for users to share overseas shopping experiences and product recommendations in China, Xiaohongshu has evolved into a multifaceted platform that combines social networking, content creation, and e-commerce functionalities.
Rebranded from Sharee (シェアリー) in Japan, Lemon8 has being launched in Southeast Asia in 2021 and it is gaining popularity in Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Malaysia. As opposed to XHS, Lemon8 content is localized in respective markets. For example, Lemon8’s content is mainly Thai in Thailand, Vietnamese in Vietnam, and Malay in Malaysia.
Xiaohongshu on another hand serves predominantly Chinese content and is only popular among Chinese around the world, it is like a bridge between China and overseas Chinese populations.
Total Xiaohongshu users in Malaysia & the rest of the world
According to the official data from Xiaohongshu, its Monthly Active Users (MAU) have reached 260 million worldwide, with a 3:7 ratio of male to female users.
Cited from the same data source, Xiaohongshu has 1.5 million users in Malaysia, which means that on average, one out of every four or five Chinese here is using the platform. The users’ age range is mostly between 20 and 35 years old, with more than 80% being women.
On the other hand, it is reported that there are around 550,000 Singaporeans on Xiaohongshu in 2022, and the content they share mainly revolves around food, fitness, and beauty.
As reported in 2022, Malaysia is interestingly the top targeted overseas market on the Xiaohongshu advertising platform in China.
A more recent report indicates that there are more than 2.5 million Xiaohongshu users in Malaysia, which is the second highest among countries outside China.
Total Lemon8 users in the world & Malaysia
Debuted in Japan first in 2020, Lemon8 has been launched in selected Southeast Asia countries in 2021. By 2022, Lemon8 boasted 5 million active monthly users worldwide.
While it is small in comparison to XHS, we have to consider that Xiaohongshu has been around for many years already and its big chunk of 260 million users are from China.
After launching in the US and UK markets in 2023, Lemon8 has garnered around 16 million downloads with about 4.25 million active users in the US alone.
So, how many Lemon8 users are there in Malaysia? While there is no data reference at the time of writing, we can gauge its popularity from the app store’s ranking.
As of July 2023, Lemon8 is ranked first in the Lifestyle category of Apple App Store and sixth in the Google Play Store.
We will update here when there is more data to share in the future!
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