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Agence France-Presse

Competition is fierce for professional photographers at Beijing’s tourist hotspots, including a scenic lake where women in flowy traditional robes pose for snaps to share on RedNote, China’s massively popular lifestyle app also known as Xiaohongshu.
The platform, which is reportedly preparing to file to go public as soon as this year, has shaken up the tourism industry in China, where domestic travel is booming to record levels.
RedNote’s interface is similar to the US social network Pinterest, but it is sometimes nicknamed “China’s Instagram” as users can post photos and videos and even livestream.
Travellers use the app to discover new destinations and plan their itineraries around photogenic locations, like the lake in the capital’s historic Shichahai area – one of many daka or “check-in” spots where RedNote is driving even more footfall.
On a recent Monday, photographer Li Geng, 18, stood with a camera slung across her neck, touting her services to wandering tourists whom she charges 10 yuan (US$1.50) per photo.
Metres away, other photographers yelled instructions to ornately dressed young women who held their fingers in victory signs and arched their backs for the camera.

Li says many of her competitors have a significant social media presence, including one who has 45,000 followers on RedNote and charges lower prices for photos.
That has caused “more customers to flock to him while putting a massive amount of pressure on the rest of us”, she says.
In contrast, Li, who has no big online following, can “only rely on calling out to people on the street to get customers”.
Domestic travel in China hit record highs last year, the Xinhua news agency reported in March, with trips by residents exceeding 6.5 billion, up more than 16 per cent year on year.
Meanwhile, RedNote’s user base has grown to 350 million monthly active users, data analysis platform Qiangua said in May, from 300 million a year earlier.
The app has boosted lesser-known businesses and sent tourists in droves to unconventional locations such as Zibo, a quiet industrial city in Shandong province, after its cheap, marinated barbecue skewers went viral.
Xiaohongshu is now the first place a lot of younger travellers seek inspiration, says Ming Yii Lai, a senior consultant at Daxue Consulting.

Tourist Mina Chen, visiting the Shichahai area with her sister, had planned her Beijing trip using recommendations from other RedNote users.
Searching popular keywords like “citywalk” on the app brought up itineraries for the day, including where to eat and convenient routes from one attraction to another.
“It is now indispensable [to me],” says the 20-year-old student from Hunan province.
RedNote-driven travel has caused issues including overtourism at viral spots and businesses becoming too dependent on platform traffic, Lai says.
Paid posts from food bloggers “who sing high praises about shops or destinations” have also drawn complaints when their recommendations are disappointing.
The app took the global spotlight last year when a proposed US government ban on the social media platform TikTok sent American users, dubbed “TikTok refugees”, flocking to RedNote.
It has also made headlines in recent weeks over its preparations to confidentially file for an initial public offering in Hong Kong, according to outlets including the Wall Street Journal, which said its market debut could be as early as the end of 2026.

Young women in more affluent cities remain the app’s core user base, according to Qiangua.
But it is also gaining traction with Chinese speakers in countries like Malaysia and Singapore – and not just among young women.
Singaporean retiree Ernest Phua, 58, turned to RedNote to plan trips to Guangdong and Yunnan in China, searching for “travel strategy” in Mandarin to find recommendations.
There is “a great difference” viewing travel content about China on the app compared with other platforms like YouTube, Phua explains.
He says that if people want to know what it is really like in China and what locals like to do, eat and visit, “Xiaohongshu has lots of content”.
Meng Jiaxuan, 20, who is dolled up in her traditional outfit at Shichahai, says she had even researched poses for her photo shoot on RedNote.
“No matter what it is, I just search for it on Xiaohongshu,” she says.


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Lifestyle

Travel & Leisure

Chinese lifestyle app RedNote is now the first place to which many younger travellers turn to seek inspiration, one expert says


Chinese lifestyle app RedNote is now the first place to which many younger travellers turn to seek inspiration, one expert says.


‘Indispensable to me’: how RedNote has taken over China’s travel scene

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Chinese lifestyle app RedNote is now the first place to which many younger travellers turn to seek inspiration, one expert says

Chinese lifestyle app RedNote is now the first place to which many younger travellers turn to seek inspiration, one expert says