What You Need to Know About the Viral “Tiramisu Cake” Dance Challenge

In recent weeks, the “Tiramisu Cake” dance competition has taken over Korean social media on platforms like TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram. People from all walks of life, from elementary school students to office workers to K-pop stars, have posted videos of themselves dancing to an electronic indie pop song called “Tiramisu Cake.”

The trend has also started going viral across Asia, as various K-pop artists and social media influencers continue to upload music videos featuring the catchy and upbeat track.

Here’s what you need to know about the “Tiramisu Cake” challenge that’s all the rage on social media.

What is the “Tiramisu Cake” challenge?

The “Tiramisu Cake” dance usually begins with the person shaking their hips while holding one arm in the air. Then, they raise both arms before lowering them again, all the while continuing to shake their hips to the beat of the chorus. After this, some users turn around and repeat some or all of these moves, while others may start freestyling.

Here’s a clip of Jeonghan from K-pop boy band SEVENTEEN demonstrating the choreography:

Why is the “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge trending on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube?

Various Korean celebrities, especially K-pop stars and Korean social media influencers, have posted video clips of themselves dancing to “Tiramisu Cake” and turned the dance challenge into a viral phenomenon.

Which Korean celebrities have posted dance videos to the song?

Many K-pop artists, such as Taeyeon, IVE’s Rei, Mamamoo’s Moonbyul, The Boyz’s Younghoon, and various members of TXT, NCT, ZEROBASEONE, TWS, and other groups participated in the “Tiramisu Cake” challenge. Other Korean celebrities, such as comedian and TV personality Park Myung-soo and trot singer and actor Jeong Dong-won, also shared their own dance clips.

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What are the origins of the “Tiramisu Cake” challenge?

It turns out that the origins of the “Tiramisu Cake” dance are more complicated than you might think.

The choreography is actually taken from the animated video below for the 2014 hit song “Little Apple” by Chinese actor-singer duo Chopstick Brothers. The song blew up on the internet at the time and even won the International Song Award at the 2014 American Music Awards.

Who is the cartoon character shown dancing in some of the “tiramisu cake” videos?

Some of the “Tiramisu Cake” videos feature a cute cartoon character with spiky hair dancing in a green outfit. This is an avatar of Gon Freecss, the young male protagonist of the popular manga series Hunter × Hunter by Yoshihiro Togashi. In 2021, several YouTube users began posting music videos featuring Gon’s avatar performing the “Little Apple” dance, but usually to the tune of Asian American electronica and hip-hop group Far East Movement’s single “Like A G6,” which reached number one on the Billboard charts.

How did the “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge start?

On May 28, 2024, a Korean TikTok user uploaded a seven-second video clip of Gon’s avatar performing the “Little Apple” dance, but to the chorus of a Korean song called “Tiramisu Cake.”

The video went viral, and Korean netizens noticed that they found the song and choreography quite addictive. Many of them quickly started posting videos of themselves dancing to the song on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, and thus the “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge was born.

While most of the videos featured one or more people dancing, some users posted their own variations of the challenge, such as lifting weights or waving their pets’ paws to the beat of the song. Zepeto, Asia’s largest metaverse platform owned by Korean tech conglomerate Naver, also launched its own “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge, inviting users to share videos of their avatars dancing to the song.

Who sings “Tiramisu Cake”?

The song “Tiramisu Cake” was originally written and performed by South Korean indie pop-rock band It is nightThe group debuted in 2013 with the single “Melancholy” and released their self-titled debut album later that year.

Who are the members of We Are The Night?

The group currently consists of vocalist Ham Byeong-seon (aka “9z”), guitarist Jeong Won-jung (aka “Lil Fish”), bassist Hwang Seong-su, and drummer Kim Bo-ram.

When was the original song “Tiramisu Cake” released?

“Tiramisu Cake” was released in 2015 as part of We Are The Night’s EP. Star, fire, night and other things like thatwhich was nominated for Best Electronic Album at the 2016 Korean Music Awards (roughly Korea’s equivalent of the Grammys).

We Are The Night posted a few videos of the “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge on their Instagram account. Although the group hasn’t released new music in a few years, the members have stated that they will be doing so very soon.

Which Korean Celebrities Covered “Tiramisu Cake”?

Korean actor Kim Sung-cheol (Our beloved summer, Vincenzo) sang a cover of “Tiramisu Cake” for the 2018 K-drama’s soundtrack A. Jenny.

In April this year, popular Korean singer-songwriter 10CM released a cover of the song.

What is the song “Tiramisu Cake” about?

The lyrics of the song are told from the perspective of a man who meets a woman at a friend’s birthday party and falls in love with her at first sight. Although the woman shows no interest to him, he can’t stop thinking about her and finds everything about her as sweet as tiramisu cake.

The song’s simple yet original lyrics and catchy chorus helped it go viral on Korean social media.

What does We Are The Night think about the “Tiramisu Cake” dance challenge?

It’s kind of crazy to think that a song that came out nine years ago is going viral today, but that’s the beauty and power of social media. For the group We Are The Night, seeing tons of people in Korea and other countries dancing to their song was a pleasant surprise.

“We found out about the dance challenge when people around us told us that they saw someone dancing to our song or that a K-pop idol posted a video of our song on their Instagram,” We Are The Night vocalist Ham Byeong-seon shared via email. “And when we did some research online, we saw that the song was topping TikTok’s music charts.”

“At first we didn’t know why and we were like, ‘What’s going on?’ But now we’re really happy that so many people are listening to our music because of this dance challenge,” Ham says.

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