The World’s #1 Tiktoker Is, You Guessed it, Italian
With over 1 billion active monthly users, TikTok is currently the second most active social media platform. While this fact surely won’t surprise you, what you probably did not know is that the most popular Tiktoker in the world is, in fact, Italian.
With more than 151 million followers and 2.5 billion likes, Khaby Lame has soared through phone screens and mobile devices to become the world’s most popular Tiktoker.
Lame’s rise to fame is truly remarkable, considering the adversity he has had to overcome in his life. Lame was born in Senegal in 2000. When he was a toddler, his parents decided to immigrate to Italy, settling in Chivasso, just outside of Torino.
Growing up in public housing, Lame was educated in Italy and embarked on a career in machinery before he was laid off because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
With no steady income and with TikTok just beginning to take off, Lame began to make a big bet on the video platform. He shifted his time and attention to producing lighthearted content and developed a signature hand gesture sign-off.
Less than three years later, Lame has become a TikTok phenom, surpassing previous TikTok royalty such as Addison Rae and Italian American Charli D’Amelio.
Lame’s annual earnings from TikTok are estimated to be more than $5 million per year.
Khaby Lame has come quite a long way from the public housing developments of Torino.