The European Commission just dropped the hammer on TikTok's entire user experience design. In preliminary findings released Friday, EU regulators accused the short-video giant of deliberately engineering its app to be addictive, targeting everything from infinite scroll and autoplay to push notifications and its AI-powered recommendation engine. The ruling could force a complete redesign of how TikTok's 150 million European users interact with the platform, and it marks one of the most aggressive regulatory moves yet under the EU's Digital Services Act.
TikTok woke up Friday to what could be its biggest regulatory crisis yet. The European Commission didn't just slap the company with a warning - it accused the platform of deliberately building addiction into its core product design.
The preliminary findings center on TikTok's failure to comply with the EU's Digital Services Act, the sweeping regulation that took effect in 2024. According to the Commission's statement, TikTok "did not adequately assess" how design choices like infinite scroll, autoplay videos, and constant push notifications impact user well-being - especially for minors and vulnerable adults.
"By constantly 'rewarding' users with new content, certain design features of TikTok fuel the urge to keep scrolling and shift the brain of users into 'autopilot mode'," the Commission wrote. "Scientific research shows that this may lead to compulsive behaviour and reduce users' self-control."
The regulators called out TikTok for ignoring what they termed "important indicators of compulsive use" - metrics the company already tracks, like how much time users spend scrolling at night and how frequently they open the app. The implication is clear: TikTok knows exactly how addictive its platform is, and it's done nothing meaningful to address it.
Now the Commission wants a fundamental overhaul. TikTok must change the "basic design" of its interface by killing infinite scroll, forcing screen time breaks, and restructuring its recommendation system. That's not a minor tweak - it's essentially asking TikTok to rebuild the user experience that made it a global phenomenon.
