How to Build a TikTok-Style Short-Video Feature?

[luna_11]

Hi everyone,

I’m exploring how to build a short-video feature similar to TikTok for learning and experimentation. I’m not looking to promote any product — just trying to understand the technical challenges and the best way to approach them.

I would like guidance on:

Recommended tech stack for uploading, processing, and serving short videos

How to implement a vertical video feed with swipe navigation

Efficient methods for video compression, caching, and CDN delivery

Handling auto-play, mute/unmute, and video preloading

Suggestions for feed algorithms (basic ranking or personalization models)

Backend considerations: storage, transcoding, user uploads, performance

Any example projects or tutorials for building TikTok-like interfaces

If you have experience with video-heavy apps or have worked with frameworks like React, Flutter, Next.js, Node.js, or FFmpeg, I’d love to hear your insights.

Thanks in advance for any help or direction!

[Dani]

I would recommend using a CDN such as Cloudflare, which supports video streaming. That will, however, cost money. Unfortunately, I don't have any experience in streaming videos entirely in-house without using a streaming service which obviously comes with a lot of benefits such as hosting the file on the edge close to the end-user's location, etc.

[Dani]

Random thought: Out of curiosity, why does every social platform seem to be chasing TikTok's algorithm?

Other thought: Go for personalized feeds, but be aware of GDPR and CCPA and do what you need to do to respect user privacy.