Duolingo's mascot went viral on TikTok by twerking on tables and thirsting after Dua Lipa

• The official account for the language-learning app Duolingo has exploded on TikTok.
• The account has regularly leaned into current TikTok trends and audios.

Duo, the green owl mascot for language-learning app Duolingo, has long been a meme favorite online.

Duolingo's recent explosion on TikTok, where its official account has gained millions of views in the past two months, turns Duo's meme status — largely derived from the mascot's playfully threatening urges for users to do their lessons on the app — into a chaotic (and beloved) character.

Under the guidance of 23-year-old social media manager Zaria Parvez, who began to create videos for the Duolingo TikTok account in September, Duo now has his own full-fledged personality: one that twerks on conference tables, slides down walls to Taylor Swift's "All Too Well," and says he's "thirsty" for Dua Lipa, whom he has also called "mommy."

The account is incredibly culturally aware: Duo has defended LGBTQ content used in Duolingo courses by using a popular sound that quotes Cardi B thanking her haters.

The Pittsburgh Business Journal reported that the page had approximately 50,000 followers before it went majorly viral in September. Now, the account has reached 1.5 million followers, leveraging Duo's existing meme fame into becoming one of TikTok's favorite brands.

Duolingo's TikTok plays into current trends on the app

Duolingo's current TikTok content isn't typical for a brand on TikTok, where companies tend to focus on promoting their own products. It's even a departure from Duolingo's earlier TikTok content, which was primarily focused on vocabulary and slang.

Duolingo's early TikTok videos were made through a partnership with ByteDance EU as part of its LearnOnTikTok initiative and produced by a third-party agency, according to Sam Dalsimer, Duolingo's Global Head of Communications. But that partnership ended in May, Dalsimer said. When the company returned to its Pittsburgh office in September, Parvez, who had helped manage the account before, started creating content for it.

On September 30, the Duolingo account had its first major viral hit.

"When you're just tryna do your work without being terrorized by an owl," an on-screen caption reads, panning to a giant Duo suit sitting on a bank of desks as a TikTok sound saying, "how am I supposed to live, laugh, love in these conditions" plays in the background. The video has amassed over 700,000 likes and 3.3 million views.

From there, the viral hits just kept coming.

In an October 7 video with 1.8 million likes, Duo runs out from behind a corner, chasing two in-office employees off a bench as audio of Sarah Paulson screaming "the killer is escaping" in "American Horror Story: Asylum" plays in the background.

"PR team really think you can lock me in a closet and I won't break out? no one's safe," the caption on the post reads.

In one video with 1.6 million likes described as a "sneak peek at premium content you can only get with Duolingo Plus" in its caption, Duo stares forlornly out of a window before twerking on a conference table, a handprint visible on its backside.

In other instances, Duolingo has used TikTok audios that aren't widely circulating — like one upload of the Christian worship song "Awesome God" that has only been used in 2366 videos — to great success. The account's "Awesome God" video has amassed 1.8 million likes and shows Duo walking out onto a staircase full of employees clapping with the on-screen caption "when all you can say in French is 'bonjour.'"

Parvez told Insider that when it comes to selecting audios or trends to feature on Duolingo's TikTok account, nothing is too niche so long as it makes her — and if she needs a gut check, other members of her team — laugh.

"If you want to be viral, then definitely some songs might be too niche and we've run into that," Parvez told Insider. "There have been moments where we didn't gain as much traction when we used more niche audio, but our goal has just been to have fun and entertain."

Duolingo's TikTok draws on existing meme fame

Before the Duolingo TikTok took off, Duo was already internet famous. As Know Your Meme reported, memes about Duo began to circulate on Tumblr in 2017. They riffed on the idea of Duo turning vengeful when users neglected their lessons, and some, like in the post from Tumblr user knightcore below, showed edited images of Duo holding users at gunpoint for not logging in.

As Mashable reported in 2019, a tweet from Duolingo's official account showed Duo, silhouetted in a doorway, peering into a dark room with the on-screen caption "coming soon," which sparked a wave of memes about the owl coming to threaten those who had skipped their lessons.

While Duolingo itself won't go so far on TikTok as to show its mascot holding a gun or actually enacting violence, it leans into that particular reputation both in videos and when interacting with commenters.

"Duo actually captured all those people and forced them to do this!!" one comment with 60,800 likes on Duolingo's "Awesome God" video reads.

"You're not lying," Duolingo replied.

Duolingo is connecting with TikTok viewers in ways most brands aren't

While other brands have gone viral on TikTok in the past, it hasn't always been for the right reasons. Recently, the official Planters account accidentally opened the door to a flood of not-safe-for-work puns on the word "nut" when it called for users to write lyrics for a brand jingle on TikTok. Duolingo by-and-large seems to have avoided that kind of backlash on the app.

"I think having that foundation of being a brand that's mission-driven and is free really allows us, and gives us more space, to have fun in a way," Parvez said.

It's too soon to see if Duolingo's TikTok presence has resulted in a tangible increase in app downloads or the business as a whole, Parvez said. On TikTok, users leave comments saying that they've downloaded the app or that "this account has no right being this funny."

"The way that I think about it is that if I film this and it becomes viral, cool. We get users, awesome," Parvez told Insider. "But we just want to have fun at the end of the day and entertain."

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