American Airlines announced through a press release that their passengers will now be able to use TikTok for free for up to 30 minutes. Customers won’t need to purchase WiFi, and they will also be able to download it while in the air.
“Faster WiFi allows us to deliver diverse in-flight entertainment options and invest in innovative partnerships with platforms like TikTok. Customers play the lead role in helping us better understand what content they want during their inflight experience and TikTok is one of the platforms they love on the ground, and we’re thrilled to work with Viasat to give customers free access to TikTok while they’re in the air as well,” said Clarissa Sebastian, American Airlines’s Managing Director of Premium Customer Experience and Onboard Products.
The free offer has already started since 2 August, but the airline stated that the promotion is just a “trial”. The customer’s response will determine how long the trial will last.
30 minutes of free TikTok access is a neat idea to start with. But as a TikTok user myself, I can often scroll through the app for a lot more than just a half hour. Of course, I would be able to purchase WiFi to continue accessing the video sharing platform—but it definitely sounds like a ploy to encourage more young users to buy in-flight internet.
Still, it’s not a bad thing for every passenger to get a half hour access to the app for free especially if it’s a short flight. This could also encourage passengers to download the app for the sake of entertaining themselves.
If you are not (yet) a TikTok user and you’re going on an American Airlines flight, you can download the app in-flight for free. Customers would just need to enable airplane mode and connect to the “AA-Inflight” signal.
Besides TikTok entertainment, in-flight entertainment onboard their flights is free. It includes a library of “more than 600 movies and TV shows and a collection of educational tools”.
If the trial is successful, we could be seeing more free access to TikTok offered by more airlines. Our next flight might give us access to the app—we would just need to wait until air travel (or any form of long-distance travel) is allowed again.
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