The Untold Truth Of Avani Gregg

Avani Gregg is one of the most famous TikTok stars to have emerged from the social media app. Gregg is a member of the Hype House, the content creator collective based in Los Angeles which is famous for housing some of the highest TikTok earners, including Addison Rae and former members Charli D'Amelio and Dixie D'Amelio, per Cosmopolitan. 

Hype House members collaborate and promote each other's content, which often means lip-synching and dancing to viral songs, but Gregg is a unique member of the group. Known for beauty rather than dancing, Gregg rose to fame for her unique approach to makeup. She amassed followers by posting videos to her TikTok account in elaborate, unique makeup, often with the hashtag "Clown Check." 

Her first viral video was of her switching from a natural make-up look more commonly seen on other beauty influencers to her now signature Harley Quinn-inspired makeup look. Quickly gaining momentum and views, Gregg was branded the "Clown Girl" of TikTok and her fame shot up exponentially.

After moving to Los Angeles with her family to pursue her social media career full-time, the star now creates content on social media with millions of followers and subscribers on YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. As a social media star, her life is shared with millions of people every day, but there's still a lot that you probably don't know about Avani Gregg.

Before she was a social media star, Avani Gregg was a trained gymnast. Gymnastics is a notoriously grueling sport, taking its toll on the body and oftentimes culminating in injuries. Gregg trained for years as a gymnast, ultimately becoming a training level 10 gymnast before having to quit the sport due to a back injury. Though Gregg is seemingly reluctant to give the details, she was extremely dedicated to the sport, training hard for years. Before she had to quit, she even had an Instagram account dedicated to just gymnastics, which shows off her skills. Her last post on the account is from December 2017.

Her back injury meant the end of any competitive gymnastics, but she has not elaborated on the injury. In a Q&A vlog in July 2019, she revealed only a little bit of the story, saying, "I am a retired gymnast. I was level nine when I had to quit because my back ... that's a different story." In a January 2021 interview with Hollywire, Gregg went into a bit more detail, explaining, "I fractured and then broke my back, sadly. But I was doing gymnastics for like 13 years." She also revealed that, at one point, it her "dream was to go to the Olympic level."

Though some people work hard to build a social media following on TikTok and always post all the trending hashtags in hopes of making the coveted For You Page where their content could potentially be seen by millions and propel them to viral fame, Avani Gregg started posting to the app for fun without any thoughts about starting a potential career as a social media star. She shared her makeup videos with her friends as a creative outlet. While many people have semi-viral videos, few people manage to turn that into a viable career like Gregg. Her consistently entertaining content and her unique approach to makeup made her stand out from the crowd in a way that was genuine.

When her first "Clown Check" TikTok video went viral, amassing millions of views in no time at all, Gregg was surprised — especially when she started being known as "Clown Girl." The moniker stuck for a while, a tribute to her unique makeup skills on show in the video, but she didn't really love it. "I was known as 'Clown Girl,' not really a good thing to be known for, but it's fine — I understand. But I had really cool makeup in it," she told Hollywire.

She has since expanded her content and her following, becoming known as more than just the app's "Clown Girl." She credits the nickname for launching her career, and is thankful for how it propelled her to fame she was never expecting. "It got me started with, like, the views and stuff, and, like followers. I gained like 3 mil in two, three weeks."

For many who make their living on social media, negative attention can often come with having a large platform. Dealing with negative comments and hate can be taxing, especially for younger social media stars. TikTok stars are often saddled with the responsibility that comes when people rise to fame quickly and are put on pedestals, but are also held to a higher standard of scrutiny. Even the biggest names like Charli D'Amelio and Nessa Barrett have had their share of TikTok hate and backlash.

Despite her hoards of fans, Avani Gregg has had to deal with more than her fair share of hate comments, negativity, and criticism. Like for many others, it was a learning curve for Gregg. However, despite her initial struggle managing the constant opinions of others, she has found a way to say grounded — by leaning on her loved ones. She now credits her support system with helping deal with them. In a Q&A video on her channel, the social media star said, "I find it really fun and funny because no one's gonna bring me down. I know what I'm doing and I have really good friends who help me through that, and really good parents, so they help me get through all of that kind of stuff."

Although she has figured out how to deal with the slew of negativity that comes her way, Avani Gregg is sometimes pulled into drama within her own fanbase. One such instance happened when fans accused Gregg of favoritism within the fanbase. Per J-14, "the drama started after one of [Gregg's] fans attempted to get [her] attention with a message calling her out and accusing her of playing favorites among her fanbase."

Per the outlet, the original message read: "Hi, so me and thousands of your fans are upset with you. It's okay that you like her, but some times you don't even pay attention to other fans. That makes us very sad and unmotivated. There are other people besides her."

While the original message ultimately got deleted, other fans reposted it and even Gregg ended up sending it out into the Twitterverse. However, per J-14, "the initial fan started getting hate messages and 'death threats,' which led to Gregg hopping on social media again to put an end to things. "I'm genuinely so lost [right now] and the fact that I'm in the blame for someone getting death threats when I don't even know what's happening is insane," she wrote (via J-14). "First, stop hating on people it's annoying asf and very low of [you]."

She later tweeted, "i don't enjoy people feeling like this so i may just unfollow everyone one here for a lil i'm sorry."

As a member of the Hype House, Avani Gregg creates content with her housemates across their social media platforms. The house is a collective of social media stars and friends, but it's also a business — their collaborations help fuel their brands. In May 2020, original Hype House members Charli D'Amelio and Dixie D'Amelio confirmed that they had left the house, per Seventeen. A rep for the famous TikTok sisters told The Hollywood Reporter, "When the Hype House started to become more of a business, Charli and Dixie stepped away from that aspect. While their businesses are separate, their friendships with the members continue." And that wasn't the only dispute over the business aspect of the house. 

Former member Daisy Keech reportedly filed to trademark the house's name, despite not living there anymore. As one of the original members, Keech reportedly wanted more recognition for founding the influential platform. Current members, with Chase Hudson and Thomas Petrou at the helm, were involved in legal discourse, including an alleged cease and desist letter from Keech. 

As a current member of the house, Gregg surely had a front row seat to the legal drama and the effect it had on house dynamics.

Though Avani Gregg began her career on TikTok, the platform is not all she is defined by. After her initial TikTok fame stuck around past her first viral video, Gregg garnered attention across other social media platforms like Instagram and started posting vlogs to YouTube. Gregg now has millions of subscribers and followers across social media, making it her full-time job.

While she still posts to TikTok and appears in videos with her fellow content creators, Gregg has bigger aspirations than remaining just on social media. Since the careers of social media stars can be fickle — and since Gregg has had issues with TikTok deleting her account in the past, making it a bit unpredicatable — Gregg is building a fanbase outside of her content creation and creating products in line with her brand. 

As of this writing, Gregg has a line of clothing, which she sells as merchandise for her brand. The line includes sweatsuits (in classic Gen-Z fashion), as well as a collection of accessories including hats, scrunchies, bags, pouches, and phone cases, among other things. This clothing brand is surely only the beginning as Gregg begins to step outside of social media and explore other opportunities.

One of Avani Gregg's emerging passions is acting. It's not uncommon for social media stars to pivot to acting. Case in point? Gregg's fellow Hype House member Addison Rae is slated to appear in a gender-swapped remake of the popular rom-com movie She's All That titled He's All That. Often, the skills necessary to succeed on the internet — like the ability to hold an audience and a charismatic personality — are transferable traits that can make good actors. Though Gregg fell into a career as a public figure almost by accident, she is using the platform social media has given her to pursue other interests.

An aspiring actress, Gregg stars as Gemma on the web series Chicken Girls. She is also a producer and host on a Facebook Watch Original interview series called Here for It with Avani Gregg. These days, she's working on new projects and will surely pop up in more roles in the future.

Since she has climbed up the popularity ladder and amassed her fame for her makeup looks, it is not surprising that Avani Gregg's ultimate goal is to start a beauty empire. Alongside her clothing line, Gregg wants to produce physical products for her fans instead of just digital content. She has said that one day she wants to do makeup for celebrities, with Billie Eilish being her ultimate dream celebrity canvas, per Seventeen, as well as having her own beauty line.

Taking cues from other beauty creators — including friend and collaborator James Charles — Gregg launched her first beauty product in March 2021 : a custom makeup palette. According to Seventeen, her palette is a collaboration with Morphe, a popular beauty company, and is "for the bebs" (a variation of "babes" i.e. her fans). Gregg's Twitter is full of retweets of her fans receiving their orders of her makeup palette and recreating some of her looks. The TikTok star's responses are seemingly encouraging, potentially fueling her fire to create more products in order to connect with her fans.