Zero to 1.4 billion views in 72 hours. That's the trajectory of #GlitchChallenge, which TikTok's internal data team has confirmed is the fastest-rising sound in the platform's history โ€” surpassing the previous record held by the "Oh No" audio from 2021 by nearly 40%.

The Format

The challenge involves a specific editing technique: a video that appears to glitch or freeze at a critical moment, before "restoring" to reveal an unexpected cut. The format leverages a perceptual psychology phenomenon โ€” the brain's automatic attention spike in response to visual disruption โ€” to guarantee watch-through rates. Early data shows the average GlitchChallenge video has a 94% completion rate, compared to TikTok's platform average of 52%.

94%

Average video completion rate โ€” vs 52% platform average

The Brand Wave

Within 48 hours of the challenge going viral, brand social teams at Nike, McDonald's, Netflix, and Fenty Beauty all deployed GlitchChallenge-formatted videos. Nike's version garnered 44 million views in 12 hours โ€” the brand's highest single-post performance in TikTok history. McDonald's used the format to announce a new menu item, generating 800,000 organic reposts.