How Long Do Appeals Take On TikTok? (2023 Update)

Having your video taken down for review, or a receiving a suspension for community guidelines violations can be extremely frustrating.

Doubly so if your video was just starting to take off, and you truly did nothing wrong.

When TikTok removes videos or gives you a suspension, it can often be appealed. And if you’ve truly done nothing wrong, you should always take the time to do so.

However, you may be wondering – how long does the appeals process take? Does TikTok respond to appeals, and when should you expect to hear a response back?

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about content violation appeals, livestreaming suspensions, and the TikTok appeals process.

How Long Do Appeals Take On TikTok?

Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a straightforward answer.

It appears that most appeals are resolved within 3 days or so, with many happening in 24 hours or less.

However, other TikTok users have reported that they have had appeals take as long as week, while others didn’t seem to have their appeal looked at even after waiting months.

Therefore, it’s hard to know for sure. What we do know is that as TikTok’s user base has grown, they’ve continued to grow their support staff as well.

Keep in mind however that just like with support tickets, it’s possible that TikTok uses some sort of prioritization system to deal with certain appeals ahead of others.

Some factors may include:

• The seriousness of the issue.
• The size of the account making the appeal.
• Whether the TikTok was taken down using TikTok’s automated system, or was due to user reports.
• The integrity of the users that reported the video (people who regularly file false reports for example, may not be treated as seriously.)
• Whether your appeals have been overturned in the past.

These are just predictions. Unfortunately, we know very little about how how TikTok prioritizes video appeals.

However, since they have to be manually reviewed by TikTok staff, there’s unfortunately only so many that they can actually get to each day.

What Happens During The Appeals Process?

Typically when a video is taken down or pulled for review, TikTok will notify you about the specific content violation.

When you submit an appeal, the video will be reviewed by a TikTok moderator to verify whether or not the video actually violates TikTok’s community guidelines.

If after a manual review, it is found that the video does not violate TikTok’s policies, the video will be posted publicly again and may continue being pushed out to people’s For You pages.

And of course, if the video did violate the community guidelines, it will remain down. You should avoid posting the video again, even if you believe TikTok’s judgement was in error.

Appealing a content violation only takes a few moments and can only help you.

Of course, if you actually did something bad, you may wish to avoid appealing in order to avoid drawing further attention to yourself. You should instead take the time to review TikTok’s community guidelines in detail, so you prevent further strikes against your account.

More information about TikTok’s content violations and bans policy can be found here.

Should You Delete The Video During The Appeals Process?

If your video has received a content violation and you’re in the process of appealing it, should you remove the video?

This is a common question, with a simple answer – no.

At the time of the content violation, the damage has already been done. You are not helping your account in any way by deleting the video, before or during the appeals process.

If it turns out that TikTok took down the video in error (which happens quite often), the violation will be removed and the video will be made public again.

Some people even believe that TikTok pushes the video out even further than they otherwise would have if appeals are granted.

Therefore, it doesn’t really make any sense to delete the video from your page.

The only exception to this of course is if you lose the appeal, or you know that you will lose the appeal because you actually did blatantly violate TikTok’s guidelines.

What If My TikTok Account Is Permanently Suspended?

Unfortunately, there’s not really a whole lot you can do if your entire TikTok account is permanently suspended. Although TikTok does offer an appeals process for banned accounts, reports from other TikTokers indicate that these decisions are rarely overturned.

This is because it takes a lot to get permanent suspensions. TikTok may hand out temporary suspensions or shadowbans, but permanent suspensions are much more serious.

If your account is permanently suspended, it likely means:

1. You have a repeated pattern of content violations.
2. You have done something extremely serious or illegal.

In very extreme scenarios, TikTok may completely ban your device or network from making new accounts at all.

According to TikTok’s law enforcement guidelines, data may also be shared with law enforcement in certain situations.

Never forget that your actions on the internet follow you around forever. You are not anonymous, and things you do on TikTok can crossover into the real world.

If your account is suspended, you should appeal it as quickly as possible using the instructions within the app.

TikTok only allows a limited amount of time before the option to appeal closes. After this time period has expired, you will receive this message:

“Appeal deadline expired. You can no longer appeal this decision because the appeal deadline has passed.”

Unfortunately at this point, there’s nothing you can do except to contact TikTok support and hope for the best. However, like the message says, it’s likely too late.t

How To Appeal A Content Violation, Livestreaming Suspension, Or Ban

When your account has received a violation, TikTok will send you a notification to let you know about the issue.

You should be able to simply click on it and follow the on-screen instructions to submit your appeal.

If the option isn’t there however or you need to contact TikTok about something else, you can always submit a support ticket.

To submit a support ticket to TikTok, follow these steps:

1. Open the TikTok app.
2. Visit your profile by tapping the icon along the bottom.
3. Click the three horizontal lines in the top-right corner to open your TikTok settings.
4. Scroll down to ‘Support’
5. Tap on ‘Report a problem’
6. Tap on the icon in the top-right hand corner, which will open up a box where you can type out your message.

Note that just like appeals, TikTok support tickets can take a considerable amount of time to be processed.

Conclusion

Receiving a violation or ban on TikTok is annoying at best, and downright frustrating at worst – particularly when they’re incorrect.

Never forget that TikTok uses artificial intelligence to scan videos. AI is not perfect, and makes mistakes.

If your video truly doesn’t violate guidelines, then the video will be looked at and restored. The mark on your account will be removed, and everything will be perfectly fine.

Just have a little patience, and avoid deleting the video in the meantime!