Code in the current US iPhone app points to transfers routed through TikTok Pay, though a spokesperson reportedly said the feature is not in testing anywhere.
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Posted August 19, 2026 at 2:04 pm EST.
TikTok is building a way for users to send each other money inside direct messages, Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing code buried in the current release of its US iPhone app. A company spokesperson told the outlet that nothing is in testing in any market, placing the work at an early stage with no commitment to ship.
The code describes a familiar consumer flow. A recipient would “tap to accept” a transfer before it expired, the sender would get status updates through push notifications or an inbox, and a short note could ride along with the money, the way Venmo captions do. Settlement would run through TikTok Pay, the wallet the company already operates in Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand to handle TikTok Shop checkout.
Money Already Moves Through TikTok
Payments are not new to the app. Shoppers buy from merchants through TikTok Shop, and viewers buy digital coins to send virtual gifts to creators and livestream hosts, which can be converted into cash. The one thing the app cannot do is move money between two users, which is why Venmo and Cash App handles sit in so many TikTok bios, sending the transaction and its economics somewhere else.
The volumes explain the interest. TikTok users have spent more than $2.9 billion in the app so far this year on Sensor Tower’s count, and the app has ranked first worldwide in in-app purchase revenue since 2022. In the US, people spend more inside TikTok than inside YouTube, Facebook or Instagram.
A Fintech Push With Legal Baggage
ByteDance has spent years assembling payment tools, and both companies are recruiting for financial services roles. Several ByteDance managers running the payments effort came out of JPMorgan Chase, which had previously helped the company build its payments infrastructure.
The model is not unique to TikTok. Elon Musk has spent the past year steering X toward an “everything app,” with some creators testing X Money transfers between users.
The legal ground is less settled. TikTok and ByteDance closed a deal earlier this year moving parts of the US operation to American investors, and the Trump administration this month dropped its ban on the app for federal government devices. State attorneys general have built cases around the app’s current payment tools, alleging in various complaints that they facilitated money laundering, broke money transmission laws, or left children open to sexual and financial exploitation.
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AI-assisted content: This article was produced with the assistance of AI tools and was reviewed, edited, and fact-checked by a member of the Unchained editorial team before publication.
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