Recently, an account named “Wei Dongyi Himself” made a fresh post on Bilibili, and to top it off, the account’s little shop added a couple of brand-new math workbooks.
On the evening of August 18th, the “Wei Dongyi Himself” account dropped a video titled “An Interesting Problem,” walking viewers through several math questions with step-by-step solutions.So far, that clip has racked up over 220,000 views.On top of that, the account’s shop window now features two math workbooks — one for elementary students and one for middle schoolers, both edited by Wei himself. They’re priced at 39.8 yuan and 49.8 yuan, respectively.
Sales data shows that the elementary-level workbook has already moved more than 1,000 copies, while the middle-school edition has sold upwards of 200 units.Both product listings are tagged with the slogan “Learn Math with Wei Dongyi” and feature his photo front and center.
According to JiuPai News, Wei Dongyi’s relatives confirmed that the account is indeed his, the video was posted by him personally, and the books are his own editorial work.
As of now, the “Wei Dongyi Himself” Bilibili account boasts 657,000 followers and has posted just two videos in total. Besides the “Interesting Problem” clip, the other one is a 5-second video uploaded on June 4, 2025. In it, Wei introduces himself: “Hi everyone, I’m Wei Dongyi, and this is my account.” That short clip has blown up with 11.667 million views and 28,000 comments so far.
Back in June, Wei Dongyi opened accounts on Bilibili, Douyin, and several other social platforms, which instantly grabbed everyone’s attention. His Douyin account, for instance, has only one video — that same self-introduction — yet it’s amassed over 19.6 million followers. That same month, the World Record Certification Agency (WRCA) officially recognized him as the person with the most followers gained in the academic field on Douyin within 72 hours.
Shortly after his first video went live, online discussions started swirling around everything from Wei’s dental health and how the account is run to his day-to-day care. In response, a representative from Peking University’s School of Mathematical Sciences told the media that the university is deeply concerned about Wei’s well-being, is helping him get proper treatment, and hopes netizens will join in protecting the quiet, focused environment a scholar needs to do serious research.
Meanwhile, the internet also saw a wave of fake accounts trying to cash in on Wei’s name, hawking merchandise under false pretenses, and even some intrusive behavior like“ambush filming” and “mob-style following” in real life.In response, the Beijing Municipal Cyberspace Administration stepped in, directing platforms like Douyin, Kuaishou, and Weibo to clean up over 5,000 violating accounts. That included removing 4,699 pieces of content tied to stalking and trend-hopping, shutting down 32 livestream rooms, and taking action against 740 “self-media” accounts engaged in malicious filming or distorted commentary — through bans, profit restrictions, or outright closure.
According to the official website of Peking University’s School of Mathematical Sciences, Wei Dongyi was a postdoctoral researcher at the Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research from December 2017 to November 2019, then served as an assistant professor at the school from 2019 until January 2026; starting February 2026, he was officially appointed as a tenured associate professor at Peking University.
Wei’s main research areas include partial differential equations and geometric analysis.He has made significant strides on the regularity problem of the three-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations and the linear damping problem of the two-dimensional incompressible Euler equations. He’s also collaborated with others on major breakthroughs in random matrix theory.
In 2020, working alongside Yang Shiwu, an assistant professor at the Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research, Wei used a novel vector field as a multiplier to study the long-time decay behavior of solutions to defocusing semilinear wave equations. Their work improved existing results and nailed down pointwise decay estimates for solutions in low dimensions — notably resolving a conjecture proposed by Terence Tao and others a decade earlier regarding pointwise decay in the one-dimensional case.
