Kwai

Is Kwai safe?

Kwai is a real short-video app, not malware, but it carries more risk than most. It pays users in Brazil small cash rewards for watching and inviting friends, shares advertising IDs with advertisers, and has a record of content involving minors that moderation missed. We score it 42/100, close to TikTok (41) and well below CapCut (53).

Kwai is the international version of Kuaishou, a Chinese short-video app. Outside China it is strongest in Brazil, where the company, citing third-party data, said in 2025 that it had about 60 million monthly users, up from the 48 million it claimed in early 2024.

Kuaishou's other attempts abroad used the same pay-to-watch formula and ran into trouble. Zynn, its US app, launched in May 2020 and climbed the App Store charts by paying users to watch videos; within weeks Google Play and then Apple removed it after reports that it was full of videos copied from other apps, and Kuaishou shut it down in August 2021. Kwai itself has been blocked in India since 29 June 2020, when the IT ministry listed it among 59 apps it said were sending users' data to servers outside India. Snack Video, its app for South and Southeast Asia, was among 43 Chinese-linked apps India blocked on 24 November 2020 on sovereignty and security grounds. In Indonesia the financial regulator's investment task force told Snack Video in March 2021 to stop its paid-reward activities until it was licensed, and the communications ministry blocked its website on 2 March at the regulator's request.

How the rewards work, and what they cost you

In Brazil the app is called "Kwai - Vídeo & Bônus Diário", and its store page reads like an offer of extra income. You collect coins for watching videos, checking in every day (the bonus grows with your streak), following creators and inviting friends, then withdraw them by Pix once you reach a minimum. "Watch for longer to unlock extra tasks," the listing advises.

That model pays you for exactly what an ad-funded app wants: more time and more data. Apple's privacy label says identifiers may be used to track you across other companies' apps and websites. Linked to your identity are contacts, name, phone number, email, financial information, photos, videos, audio, search history and how you use the app.

The privacy policy, last updated in July 2026, spells the tracking out: Kwai shares "your advertising ID and other device information such as your IP address with advertisers and measurement service providers" to connect what you do on Kwai with your activity on other apps and websites. It can collect contacts with consent, WiFi and Bluetooth details, the names of apps and files on your phone, and card, bank and withdrawal records for rewards. Data sits on servers in Singapore, run by Joyo Technology, and may be shared with group companies in other countries.

Children and moderation

This is Kwai's weakest area. In January 2024 the Brazilian outlet Núcleo spent two months testing the app. It found that Kwai recommended sexually suggestive videos of child influencers to new accounts, that comment sections carried links to sexual abuse material, some circulating since July 2022, and that search suggested abuse-related terms. Kwai said it removes violating content immediately, but one search term stayed active after Núcleo reported it.

In November 2025 the case moved to court. Brazil's labour prosecutors and the São Paulo state prosecutor's office brought a public civil action over child influencers, saying they found "countless" accounts of minors, some under 13, posting monetised content, hidden ads and content with "adultisation and eroticisation". On 10 November a judge at São Paulo's 25th labour court granted a preliminary injunction. Kwai had 30 days to remove such content, stop posting children's artistic work without court authorisation, add an in-app channel to report child labour and suspend offending accounts, with fines of R$100,000 to R$500,000 per breach. The prosecutors seek R$50 million in damages. Kwai said it cooperates with authorities and bans content that exploits minors.

Kwai's newer policy shows the pressure. For Brazil it bars under-14s, requires accounts of 14 to 16-year-olds to be linked to a parent, and bans targeted ads and advertising profiles for minors. Brazil's official rating on the App Store is 16; the US store rates the same app 13+ and lists loot boxes, messaging, user content and contests.

Fake profiles and disinformation

In January 2024 Brazil's federal prosecutors in São Paulo opened a civil inquiry into Kwai after a complaint and a report by piauí magazine. It covers fake profiles of Brazilian authorities, accounts that systematically spread election disinformation in 2022, and videos involving violence against women and minors, and asks whether some of the content, called "KwaiCuts" internally, was made by advertising agencies paid by the platform. No finding has been published. In May 2024 the federal Attorney General's Office (AGU) asked Kwai, X and TikTok, out of court, to remove false posts about flood aid in Rio Grande do Sul within 24 hours. That was a request, not a court order.

How to use Kwai more safely

1. Do not give the app access to contacts or precise location; it works without them.
2. On iPhone, refuse the tracking request; on Android, delete the advertising ID in Google settings.
3. Treat the coins as small change. Never pay a fee to "unlock" a withdrawal, and do not share your Pix keys with other users.
4. For a teenager aged 14 to 16 in Brazil, link the account to yours as the policy requires, and keep it private.
5. Report accounts that sexualise children in the app and to SaferNet Brasil.

How we scored it

Scams and harmful content (30) is Kwai's weakest factor, because of repeated findings about content involving minors and an open court order. Privacy (33) reflects ad-ID sharing across apps and a label that links contacts, financial data and media to you. Regulatory record (47) counts two orders: India's 2020 block over data sent abroad and the preliminary injunction won by public prosecutors, which is not final. The open federal inquiry and the sister app Snack Video's blocks are context. Security (50) is middling: no known breach, but no bug bounty either.