Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s turns on the Buckingham Palace balcony went viral on TikTok after Princess Kate’s big return to the limelight for Trooping the Colour.

Kate’s first public appearance of the year was for King Charles III’s birthday parade alongside Prince William and their children Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis.

And in the days afterwards, Harry and Meghan’s own turns on the palace balcony for Trooping went viral on TikTok.

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry during their two joint appearances on the Buckingham Palace balcony in June 2018 and 2019 for Trooping the Colour. The two events went viral on TikTok. MAX MUMBY/INDIGO/GETTY IMAGES
A montage of the two events, in June 2018 and June 2019, was liked 3,700 times and viewed 131,000 times.

It was posted with the message: “In lieu of Trooping the Colour 2024, here is a look back on Harry and Meghan being adorable on their balcony appearances.”

The appearance on June 9 came just weeks after Harry and Meghan’s wedding on May 19 that year, but during what was needless to say a pressured time for the duchess due to the disintegration of her relationship with her father.

Thomas Markle staged pictures with the paparazzi for money, was exposed by the Mail on Sunday and then pulled out of the wedding after suffering heart attacks.

Harry wrote in his biography Spare how the event initially went well until Meghan appeared to offend the royals: “We returned just in time for the official June celebration of granny’s birthday.

“Trooping the Color: one of our first public appearances as newlyweds. Everyone
present was in a good mood, upbeat.

“But then: Kate asked Meg what she thought of her first Trooping the Color. And Meg joked: ‘Colorful.’ And a yawning silence threatened to swallow us all whole.”

The second clip shows Harry and Meghan’s appearance at Trooping on June 8, 2019, when she wore a navy blue dress by Clare Waight Keller, who designed her wedding gown for fashion house Givenchy.

The parade again came at a difficult time for the couple who had three months earlier split off from Kensington Palace where they had previously shared a private office with William and Kate.

The relationship between the brothers had deteriorated, however, with Harry and Meghan moving out to Windsor and creating a new office at Buckingham Palace.

The two couples kept their distance on the balcony that year as well, with Harry and Meghan on Queen Elizabeth II’s left and William and Kate on her right.

Jack Royston is chief royal correspondent for Newsweek, based in London. You can find him on X (formerly Twitter) at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek‘s The Royals Facebook page.