Meet Alix Earle, the University of Miami Student Taking Over TikTok

Alix Earle.Aaron Davidson/Getty Images

A year ago, Alix Earle was just a regular college student at the University of Miami who loved fashion, beauty and talking about the two.

Over the last several months, the 22-year-old has partied with Drake, met Selena Gomez as part of a Rare Beauty launch and was invited to attend Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party by none other than Miley Cyrus herself.

Her rise to 3.4 million TikTok followers didn’t happen overnight, but the mere month it took for her numbers to double from 1.7 million is fascinating.

Earle is studying marketing at UM’s Herbert Business School and is gaining experience making a living on TikTok. If you’ve even scrolled on the app, you are likely aware of popular content like “what would Alix do,” her eyelash-curling tactic and the reason why she and her ex-boyfriend Tyler broke up. Spoiler alert: the latter also has to do with social media, more specifically the lack of her presence on his Instagram grid. 

Earle posts multiple times a day, and each video gets between one million and 11 million likes—whether it’s a shopping haul, a chatty makeup tutorial or a quirky video with her younger siblings or roommates (who have also started to gain their own followings as a result of the friendship). 

She openly talks about her Accutane journey and her breast augmentation surgery, in addition to sharing bikini clips, recreating trends and posting fashion and beauty content. Her first few videos that started to gain traction were game day tailgate “get ready with me” posts and vlog snippets.

Several TikTok trend analysts and theorists have tried to make sense of the immense fame and compared it to the rise of Charli D’Amelio and Addison Rae. 

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A post shared by Alix Ashley Earle (@alix_earle)

Many point to the fact that her GRWM videos aren’t about specific products or commerce-based. Instead, they are an opportunity to get to know Earle, hear about her day and get a snippet of the drama in her life, learn what shows she’s watching, where she parties and more. It’s a tactic that, whether she knows it or not, separates her from other creators and keeps viewers wanting more.

@snipseedofficial on TikTok took a stab at explaining.

“I feel like I actually know Alix, like if I walked into a room with Alix, I would almost know exactly what to expect,” she said. “If you take a look at her page, you’ll realize that in almost every video, she’s talking to the camera. No matter the format of the video—whether it’s a voiceover or selfie video—you can hear her voice in it and you can recognize her face. She becomes immediately recognizable which eventually turns into you feeling like you’re her friend.”

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A post shared by Alix Ashley Earle (@alix_earle)

That’s what makes Earle so appealing—her ability to be so authentically herself that she makes you feel like you are on FaceTime with your best friend.

“Original content always outperforms trends in the long run,” she continued. “Just let your personality shine.”

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