By 2026, the short drama and comic drama industries are at a critical juncture of transitioning towards "premiumization and industrialization." With the mature application of AI video models like Kling, comic dramas, leveraging their low cost, high production capacity, and strong visual impact, are taking over from live-action short dramas as the main driver of content growth for platforms. In terms of market size, the comic drama industry has already shown robust growth momentum in 2025 and is expected to maintain rapid expansion in 2026, thereby releasing the value of massive IP libraries. Concurrently, the overseas market potential for short dramas/comic dramas is vast, with revenue growth for domestic companies' overseas short drama apps expected to continue. It is advised to focus on the industry's capacity release, maintaining a "Buy" rating for the internet media sector. The key views of Everbright Securities are as follows:
The short drama market in 2025: Steady domestic growth, significant overseas expansion. 1) Domestic short drama market size: According to third-party agency DataEye, China's micro-short drama market is projected to reach RMB 63.43 billion in 2025, a 26% year-on-year increase, and is expected to grow to RMB 85.65 billion by 2027, with a compound annual growth rate of 19.2% from 2025 to 2027. The short drama industry remains typically "traffic acquisition-driven," with spending on micro-short drama advertising traffic estimated to reach approximately RMB 42.3 billion in 2025, a 28% increase from 2024. 2) Domestic short drama supply: The pace of capacity release has noticeably accelerated, with the supply of new dramas increasing from 34,600 titles in 2024 to 39,600 titles in the first half of 2025. However, competition in "premium" short dramas has intensified; the cost per ordinary short drama ranges from RMB 400,000 to 700,000, while top-tier S-grade series can cost between RMB 1.5 million and 3 million. Under this high-cost pressure, numerous small and medium-sized production teams are seeking opportunities to break through with lower costs.
3) Short drama overseas expansion: 2025 saw scaled growth for Chinese short dramas going global, with annual revenue soaring to $2.38 billion and downloads surpassing 1.21 billion, representing year-on-year increases of 263% and 135%, respectively. The revenue landscape among overseas short drama apps is largely stable, with the top three—ReelShort, DramaBox, and GoodShort—collectively holding over 53% market share in 2025, indicating that overall market concentration remains high.
The comic drama market in 2025: A multi-billion-yuan track driven by AI. 2025 marks the inaugural year for AI comic dramas in China. The core of AI comic dramas lies in leveraging online literature IPs and utilizing AI tools for a fully digital production process encompassing script generation, character modeling, scene drawing, and voice synthesis, presenting a composite content form that blends "comic visual style with short drama narrative pacing." A comic drama typically features episodes lasting 3-8 minutes, with a total runtime of 80-120 minutes. Its core characteristic is being "actor-free," eliminating reliance on actors and filming locations while retaining the key advantages of short dramas—strong plots and high conflict—making it a new content format catalyzed by advancements in AI technology.
1) AI comic drama market size: According to Ocean Engine data, the market size is expected to exceed the RMB 20 billion mark in 2025, with 46,931 comic drama titles launched annually, achieving leapfrog growth, particularly showing a "step-like growth" trend in the second half of the year. From a commercialization perspective, the daily GMV for paid AI comic dramas on Douyin alone surpassed RMB 10 million in 2025. Leading companies like Soy Sauce Culture Animation began a comprehensive shift to producing comic dramas early in 2025, achieving rapid revenue growth.
2) Major platforms supporting comic dramas: The launch of the Hongguo free comic drama app in 2025 is a landmark event for the sector's development, signaling major platforms' accelerated investment in this track. This has prompted platforms like iQiyi, Youku, Tencent Video, Mango TV, Kuaishou, Bilibili, and Xiaohongshu to intensify communication with content producers to secure production capacity. Companies such as Douyin, iQiyi, and Baidu are supporting comic drama producers through cash incentives and revenue sharing models. To address the shortage of original scripts, companies like China Literature and 7cat opened adaptation rights for over 100,000 online literature IPs in 2025.
3) AI effectively enhances comic drama production capacity: AI technology permeated the entire comic drama creation chain in 2025, including the planning and scripting phase, video production phase, and audio and post-production phase. Throughout the process, AI systems can monitor production progress in real-time and allocate creative tasks, supporting an industrialized production capacity of "60 episodes produced by 15 people in 20 days." This ultimately reduces the production cost per minute of a comic drama to RMB 400 and compresses the production cycle to 10-13 days.
Risk analysis: Risks of intensifying industry competition; IP business expansion falling short of expectations; expanding user acquisition costs leading to sustained losses; tightening of content regulatory policies.
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