If Moonshot AI has a favorite advertising platform, it might be TikTok.
AdTechRadar reviewed publicly available ad campaign data as of July 28 across four major platforms – TikTok, Google, LinkedIn, and Meta – and found that the Beijing-based AI company has run nearly 165,000 TikTok ads so far in 2026 across more than 30 countries. (Unfortunately, TikTok’s Ads Library does not include U.S. ad data.)
Looking across Google, LinkedIn, and Meta using each platform’s global ad libraries – which do include U.S. campaigns – we found:
Essentially, of the ads observed, more than 99% were on TikTok, with roughly 275× as many ads on TikTok as on Google, 3,363× as many as on LinkedIn, and 8,240× as many on Meta. Put simply, Moonshot really likes TikTok.
Here’s a deeper look at Moonshot’s TikTok activity each month. Moonshot’s ads seemed to track with Kimi model updates and launches:
| Month | TikTok ads | Major release |
| January | 9,407 | Kimi K2.5 |
| February | 37,750 | — |
| March | 41,122 | — |
| April | 31,706 | Kimi K2.6 |
| May | 28,748 | — |
| June | 0 | Kimi K2.7 Code |
| July (1–28) | 16,066 | Kimi K3 |
After serving nearly 29,000 ads in May, Moonshot’s TikTok campaigns dropped to zero in June. (Again, this is non-U.S.-only data.) Maybe Moonshot was holding its firepower? It’s unclear.
Either way, ads resumed in July, seemingly timed to the launch of Kimi K3, with +16,000 ads in just 28 days.
Why This Matters:
Volume, of course, is interesting. But what really caught our attention was the messaging in some of the ads, particularly those featuring Western influencers.
Some of Moonshot’s most popular ads this year, based on TikTok’s “unique users seen” metric, were boosted promotional videos for Kimi featuring AI and tech influencers MaverickGPT (based in the U.S.) and Alex Intelligence (based in Canada).
These four ads – which appear to be among the most-seen English-language influencer ads promoting Moonshot this year – share another common trait: they position Chinese AI models as challenging leading U.S. models.
See the ads in full:
Here’s a closer look:
| Creator | Opening hook | Supporting creative | Public views* |
| Alex Intelligence | “China just destroyed OpenAI’s entire business model…” | Chinese flag visible in the background | 1.1M+ |
| MaverickGPT | “China just did it again and dropped an AI model that beats ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini on almost every benchmark…” | On-screen text: “China just destroyed every AI 🤯” | 37.1M+ |
| MaverickGPT | “China just dropped an AI model that beats GPT-5 on every benchmark and no one is talking about it…” | On-screen text: “This Chinese AI just beat ChatGPT 🤯” | 34.5M+ |
| Alex Intelligence | “China just gave everyone their own AI army…” | Chinese flag visible in the background during video | 17.2M+ |
*View counts are based on the creators’ public TikTok pages and are not limited to the countries covered by TikTok’s Ads Library.
Ultimately, it looks like Moonshot is using TikTok – and influencers on it – to tell a story that’s bigger than simply “Kimi is good.” Their ads position China’s models as rivaling or outpacing, in some cases, U.S. companies.
Our Take:
All of this is interesting, of course! The interplay between TikTok and Moonshot is also a bit more notable given TikTok’s (unique) place in geopolitical conversations. Essentially, we have a Chinese AI company using a China-founded social media platform to amplify a narrative around China’s AI progress.
Anyway, Moonshot isn’t slowing down anytime soon. The company just announced a $3.5 billion funding round from China’s National AI Industry Fund. So, more TikTok ads are probably coming.
