Safety Rating Explanation: Because it is owned by Chinese Communist Party–affiliated ByteDance, this app should not be downloaded at all.
What Is Lemon8?
Lemon8 is a social media platform focused on lifestyle content, such as fashion, beauty, food, and travel. While it is similar to Instagram in many ways, it also has unique features like a double-column feed and a focus on product discovery and shopping. Lemon8 users can use hashtags to find content that interests them as well as join groups that share their interests. Lemon8 is owned by ByteDance, the Chinese company that created TikTok.
Is Lemon8 Safe for My Child?
No. While Lemon8 guidelines prohibit explicit content, they make exceptions for educational, artistic, documentary, and scientific images. Despite requiring members to be at least 18 years old to register for an account, the lack of age verification means that that the rule can be easily bypassed. Lemon8, like all forms of social media, can foster addictive behavior patterns that harm children’s mental health. ByteDance’s ownership of the platform also means that user data is likely being exploited in a similar manner to the user data on TikTok.
