TikTok's UK company achieves first-time profitability, as Chinese overseas-expanding platforms enter a harvest period.

TikTok UK achieves first-time profitability as Chinese platforms expanding overseas enter a harvest period.

In 2025, after years of burning money in overseas markets such as Europe and Latin America, TikTok finally began to make a profit.

Public information shows that in 2025, TikTok's UK company and its consolidated subsidiaries achieved revenue of $9.1 billion (approximately RMB 61.7 billion), a year-on-year increase of 45.7%, and net profit of $703 million (approximately RMB 5.1 billion), achieving profitability for the first time.

This result did not come easily — after all, the actual business scope of TikTok's UK company and its consolidated subsidiaries covers three major markets: Europe, Latin America and South Africa. In 2023, TikTok lost $1.36 billion in these markets; in 2024, although revenue continued to grow, it still lost $657 million. It was not until 2025 that this overseas business truly crossed the breakeven line.

Image source: Forbes

The core reason TikTok was able to turn its losses around is that its traffic became more valuable. As the user base continued to expand, more and more brands were willing to advertise on TikTok. Livestreaming and e-commerce businesses also gradually picked up growth. The platform can both retain users with content and allow creators and merchants to directly complete product conversions.

TikTok Shop, in particular, is becoming an important source of revenue growth. As of June 2026, TikTok Shop had entered 10 European markets. In France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Ireland alone, more than 100,000 businesses have joined the platform.

From August 2025 to February 2026, the average daily GMV in these markets achieved triple-digit growth. With more merchants and products, users who see a review video can go directly to the product page to place an order, and creators can also earn income through product sales, continuing to produce more content. With advertising, short videos, influencers and e-commerce packed into the same platform, the efficiency of monetizing TikTok's traffic has also improved.

Image source: TikTok

At the same time, the company's expenses began to be controlled. In 2025, TikTok's marketing and administrative expenses in the related markets grew 40.4% year-on-year, lower than the 45.7% revenue growth rate; the number of employees also dropped from nearly 8,000 to 6,842.

However, it should be noted that the $703 million net profit included tax credits brought by previous losses. After excluding this impact, TikTok's operating profit for the year was about $452 million, and pre-tax profit was about $280 million. Although the actual operating earnings were not as dramatic as the book net profit, from consecutive losses to the main business starting to make money, TikTok's overseas business has indeed reached a turning point.

Image source: Companies House

Chinese platforms expanding overseas have been delivering frequent good news recently.

Looking beyond TikTok, there are indeed quite a few Chinese platforms expanding overseas that have recently brought good news.

First is AliExpress, a veteran in overseas expansion. Alibaba's financial report for the June 2026 quarter shows that AliExpress achieved profitability at the operating level in that quarter, mainly benefiting from logistics optimization and improved cost efficiency, and the contribution of local products to sales is also continuously increasing.

In the past, many products on AliExpress had to be shipped cross-border from China, making delivery times and logistics costs difficult to control. In recent years, the platform has encouraged merchants to send products to European overseas warehouses in advance, while also introducing more local products. After an order is placed, products can be shipped directly from the local market, delivery is faster, and logistics costs and return pressure are easier to manage.

Currently, AliExpress's overseas hosted service covers more than 30 countries and regions around the world. During this year's '618' promotional event, local orders in key markets such as Spain, France and Poland exceeded 50%.

Image source: SHEIN

Another platform expanding overseas, SHEIN, also delivered impressive results. Relying on its flexible supply chain and fashion product operations, SHEIN has accumulated a huge global user base. On August 24 this year, SHEIN officially launched its Hong Kong offering, and on September 1 it listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, becoming the largest cross-border e-commerce IPO on the Hong Kong stock market in 2026. The final offer price was HK$48.56 per share, and the global offering raised net proceeds of approximately HK$13.214 billion. Its total market value on the first day of listing reached HK$205 billion.

Temu, also one of the 'Four Little Dragons of Chinese overseas expansion,' has been around for a relatively short time, but its expansion speed is astonishing. Similarweb data shows that in July 2026, Temu ranked second globally in e-commerce and shopping website traffic with 1.11 billion monthly visits, behind only Amazon, holding the runner-up position for three consecutive months. Its unique de-duplicated audience reached 271.5 million. For a platform that has been online for only a few years, these results are enough to show that global consumers' demand for highly cost-effective products is real and huge.

Image source: Similarweb

Strictly speaking, these platforms have taken different paths. TikTok relies on short videos and creator networks to gather users; AliExpress continuously improves overseas warehouses and local product supply; SHEIN excels at supply chain and fashion operations; and Temu has rapidly pushed its platform into more countries. But their achievements all prove one point: Chinese platforms already have the ability to acquire users, organize products and operate markets on a global scale. The traffic, warehouses, logistics and merchant networks invested in earlier are gradually turning into profits, listing opportunities and more stable market positions.

For any player expanding overseas, the next real question is: who can turn the accumulated overseas users and market scale into stable revenue and continue to retain profits? Whoever answers this question well will have the chance to make their global business last longer.