WeChat is rarely blocked: India has banned it since June 2020, and a US ban ordered in August 2020 was halted by a judge and later revoked. In China it isn’t blocked, but it filters what China-registered accounts can say.
Every day we open WeChat from inside 24 countries, mostly over home broadband, and record
where it’s blocked, since when and how.
1 of 24tested countries with a confirmed block of WeChat
Blocked on some networks in India. 24 of 24 results confirmed in the last 48 hours.
Blocked means the networks we test there failed to open www.wechat.com, twice, while it opened elsewhere.
“Turned away by the site” means WeChat itself refused visitors from that country.
* First observed on this date: the block may be older. Older results are excluded from current totals.
Background
Where WeChat is restricted, and why
Governments that act against WeChat mostly cite security and data rather than its content. India’s IT ministry blocked it on 29 June 2020 with TikTok and 57 other apps under Section 69A of the IT Act, and from late July WeChat logged out accounts registered with Indian numbers, saying it couldn’t serve them “pursuant to Indian law”. Russia blocked it for about a week in May 2017, until WeChat gave the regulator the details needed to list it in a register of online services.
The United States tried to ban WeChat outright. A presidential order of 6 August 2020 barred transactions with it from 45 days later, citing its data collection and reports that it censored content the Chinese Communist Party considered sensitive. The ban was due to take effect on 20 September 2020, but that morning a federal magistrate judge in California blocked it, siding with users who said it curbed their free-speech rights. President Biden revoked the order on 9 June 2021.
Inside China WeChat isn’t blocked, but it filters what users there can say. Citizen Lab found in 2016 that keyword filtering applies to accounts registered with mainland Chinese phone numbers, and stays on even if the account is later linked to a foreign number. In 2020 it found that images and files sent only between accounts registered outside China are scanned too, and that those judged politically sensitive are then censored for China-registered users.
Canada limits WeChat only on official devices. It removed the app from government-issued phones on 30 October 2023, after its chief information officer found that it posed “an unacceptable level of risk to privacy and security”, although the government said it had no evidence that its information had been compromised.
Key dates
Canada removes WeChat from government-issued phones, citing “an unacceptable level of risk to privacy and security”.
President Biden revokes the US order against WeChat, which never took effect.
A US magistrate judge blocks the WeChat ban hours before it was due to start, siding with users who said it curbed their free speech.
President Trump orders a ban on transactions with WeChat from 45 days later, citing its data collection and censorship.
India blocks WeChat with TikTok and 57 other apps; a month later WeChat logs out accounts registered with Indian numbers.
Russia blocks WeChat for about a week, until it provides the details needed to list it in a register of online services.
Get past a block
WeChat blocked where you are?
A VPN connects you through a server in another country, so a local block on WeChat no longer applies. Where VPNs themselves are blocked, you need one that can disguise its traffic.
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History
Changes for WeChat
No confirmed changes since monitoring began on 29 Sep 2026. When a block appears or lifts, and a re-check on several machines agrees, it shows up here.
Method
How we test
Test machines on the two biggest home-internet providers in most countries open the homepage every day.
A failure counts only when it happens twice on the same network, while the site opens from other countries.
A change is published only after re-checks a few hours later and again the next day, on several machines per provider, confirm it. It’s dated from the first sighting.
Test machines caught getting around blocks, through a VPN or a filter-dodging tool, are set aside.
We test websites, mostly over home broadband. Apps, calls and mobile networks can behave differently.
India has banned it since June 2020. Russia blocked it for about a week in May 2017, and a US ban ordered in August 2020 was stopped by a court before it began and revoked in June 2021. Canada has barred it only on government-issued phones since October 2023.
Is WeChat Banned in the US?
No. President Trump’s August 2020 order would have barred transactions with WeChat from 20 September 2020, but a federal magistrate judge blocked it that morning, siding with users who said it curbed their free speech, and President Biden revoked the order in June 2021.
Is WeChat Censored Outside China?
Partly. Citizen Lab found that keyword filtering applies only to accounts registered with mainland Chinese numbers, even after they are linked to a foreign one. But in 2020 it found that images and files sent between accounts outside China are scanned, and that those flagged are then censored for China-registered users.
