Before DeepSeek, Rednote (FKA RED and Xiaohongshu) was the free app that dominated Chinese and US social media. But before the app captured the attention of US users, it was favoured by many Chinese users for finding shop and restaurant recommendations and travel advice. From WeChat owner Tencent to TikTok owner ByteDance, many have tried to make a similar app without much success. Now, there is another challenger for the lifestyle app throne, food delivery platform Meituan’s Yami.
On 21 January, Meituan launched 鸭觅 (Yami, playing on the English word yummy), the app that takes aim at Rednote. As the name literally means “duck seeks”, the icon of the app shows a duck’s backside as it dives into the water while searching for food. The app’s slogan is “Let’s find great restaurants together”, emphasising Meituan’s ambition to build a foodie community. This not only differentiates itself from Rednote’s everything app dominance but also makes use of Meituan’s expertise in restaurants and takeaways.
The catch is that the app is currently undergoing internal testing. Users need an invitation code to join, but each user can invite 3 friends to the platform. Users can provide information regarding their hometown, down to the county level. Meituan tries to create regional circles for good food. Similar to Rednote, users can use images and text to recommend or review restaurants, and others can save these notes for future reference. At its current point, however, the app does not support video.
Meituan has been expanding from a simple delivery platform with not just Yami, but also its Dianzai (点仔, lit. order boy) AI ordering assistant for its Dianping (大众点评) review platform. In fact, Yami, to an extent, overlaps in purpose with Dianping in reviewing restaurants, only that Dianping is similar to Google reviews. It is definitely worth watching to see how this app grows and if it will be the next Rednote or Dianping.
