Bilibili Inc., one of China’s biggest video platforms, is stepping up its push beyond the country’s borders, targeting international creators and audiences as it seeks to challenge YouTube’s dominance in online video.
The Shanghai-based company this week relaunched its international app and is preparing an English-language website, according to marketing materials circulated to creators and recent job listings. Bilibili is also building teams in markets including the US, Japan and Europe, signaling a broader effort to turn its largely China-focused platform into a global creator business.
The expansion could put Bilibili into more direct competition with Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube and other global video platforms. It also raises questions about how the company will handle content moderation, censorship and data security as it enters markets where Chinese technology companies face heightened scrutiny.
Bilibili didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The company already has a substantial audience to build on. Its main Chinese-language platform had 376 million monthly active users, giving Bilibili a scale that few emerging global video platforms can match.
Bilibili has also been courting international personalities. Among the most prominent is MrBeast, the American creator whose videos have appeared on Bilibili’s Chinese platform. The strategy suggests the company sees globally recognized creators as a way to broaden its appeal beyond its existing base of Chinese users.
The revamped international app appears designed to reduce some of the barriers that previously faced overseas users. New accounts can be created without the passport or identity-document verification that had been required for international users of Bilibili’s main platform, according to information shared through an account promoting the service to global creators.
“Bilibili is going global,” the account said in a post on X, adding that content on the international and Chinese services would be the same.
That approach could give Bilibili an unusual proposition for international creators: access to a platform with an established Chinese audience while also building a presence among users outside China.
The company is pitching the platform to creators as a way to reach young, affluent and highly educated audiences. Marketing material shared in a Discord community for Bilibili creators describes an international marketplace for connecting creators with brands for sponsored content as being under development.
An English-language version of the platform is also being prepared.
“We are working hard,” the company said in a presentation circulated to creators, which described the English version as “coming soon.”
Bilibili is simultaneously building a local presence. Job listings show the company is seeking community managers in Los Angeles, London, Mexico City, São Paulo, Istanbul and Tokyo. A Singapore-based position calls for staff to help develop global AI-powered content moderation systems.
That moderation infrastructure could become particularly important as Bilibili expands into the US and Europe.
Chinese internet companies have faced increasing pressure in Western markets over how user data is handled, how content is moderated and whether their platforms are subject to influence from Beijing. TikTok, owned by ByteDance Ltd., has spent years navigating similar concerns in the US, making Bilibili’s expansion a potentially sensitive test for another Chinese consumer internet company.
Bilibili’s challenge will also be commercial.
YouTube has spent more than a decade building a global ecosystem around creators, advertising, subscriptions and video discovery. It operates at enormous scale, with creators accustomed to sophisticated monetization tools and audiences spread across virtually every major market.
Bilibili will therefore need to offer more than access to its existing Chinese audience. It will have to convince creators that the platform can generate meaningful revenue, attract international viewers and provide the tools needed to build businesses around their content.
The company’s global strategy appears to recognize that challenge. Rather than relying solely on Chinese users traveling to its existing platform, Bilibili is establishing local teams, developing an English-language experience and building systems aimed specifically at international creators.
The result could be a new competitor in an increasingly crowded global video market.
For Bilibili, the opportunity is significant. Its domestic success has given it a large audience, a strong creator culture and experience operating one of China’s most influential online communities.
But taking that model overseas will require navigating a very different regulatory and competitive environment.
The next phase of Bilibili’s expansion will show whether its Chinese success can translate into a global creator platform — or whether the barriers facing Chinese technology companies in Western markets prove too difficult to overcome.