Why micro-dramas exploded in China

Justin Crosby speaks to Chinese micro-drama expert Wenwen Han, founder and CEO of the Short Drama Alliance, about how China built the world’s most advanced short-form drama economy. The conversation explores platform ecosystems on Douyin and WeChat, in-app payments versus ad-funded viewing, the rise of AI-generated “motion comics,” and what Western producers keep getting wrong about vertical drama. Han also shares her predictions for where the market expands next and why the US and India could be on the brink of major growth.

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Hi, I am Justin Crosby and welcome to another TellyCast. In this episode, I'm joined by Chinese Micro Drama specialist, Wenham founder, and CEO of the Short Drama Alliance for a deep dive into the world's most advanced. Short form drama market when we explains how China's micro drama ecosystem has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry.

Why platforms like Do Ya and WeChat have become the primary distribution engines and how AI generated motion comics are reshaping production economics. I hope we enjoyed the show. So when, when, lovely to meet you. Thank you very much for joining us on Telecast. How are you doing today? I'm very good.

Thank you, uh, very much for inviting. Not at all. And I've been following you with, uh, really some interest, uh, particularly the work that you've been doing with the, uh, short Drama Alliance and your founder and CEO, uh, of that [00:01:00] organization. So first of all, tell us a little bit about your background in.

Micro drama. And tell us a little bit about the, uh, short Drama Alliance. So my name is Wan Han, or you can call me Maggie. So, um, I am independent producer and also the founder of Short Drum Lines. So I used to run, uh, one person company by my own. It's a film studio, so we produce short dramas. Uh, we co-produced with some small platforms in China.

And I also used to work in Chinese platforms as a producer and head of overseas. And like a year ago, roughly a year ago, I found this short drum alliance to bridge the gap between China and overseas. So if I need to introduce our alliance. Uh, we connecting creators with platforms around emerging short drama formats.

That's what we do. [00:02:00] Okay. And tell us a little bit about the, uh, so you said that you've worked with a number of, of drama apps in China as a producer. Can you give us a, you know, tell us a little bit more about that. What, how many, how many dramas have you produced, and for what platforms? I might need to correct a little bit.

From what you said. In China, we don't have like thousands or hundreds of apps. We normally have, we have different platforms, but platforms means they control, they do the ads buy and also they control different, uh, mini program theaters, if that's how I describe as theater. So we don't launch apps in China because doin the Chinese version of TikTok is the dominate.

App and traffic source in China. So just expand on that. Sorry, you said, uh, short theaters, just, just explain that a little bit. Yes. So it's called Mini Program Theater. [00:03:00] Actually, this function just launched in December, 2025 in TikTok, the overseas TikTok, it's called TikTok Mini. It's only available in the us So if you overseas, uh, audience, listen to.

This podcast, you can just turn on the TikTok and search for this function, TikTok meaning, and this function is exactly what it launch in China in 2022. So it's like an extension in Chinese version of TikTok. We call it doing. So it's like extension in Chrome. Its intention in ing. So which means when? The viewers were scoring their phone, right?

They were scoring phones about docs, about some people dancing, and they suddenly see a creative ads. They got hooked and they click this creative ad, there's a link you click, and it was just taken them into the mini program theater where they can start [00:04:00] watching from episode one and two and three until they hit a paywall so they can click.

And they can top up directly in, into this to unlock those mini program theater, right, to watch the next episode. So it's a seamless loop. Okay. So it's, so it's essentially a function. Or it's a feature of existing social media platforms like TikTok and their, uh, uh, uh, the, uh, different, similar types of, uh, of platform available in China.

Yes, TikTok, Chinese TikTok doin is the main traffic source. There's also extensions in which extension, it's also called mini program theaters. Great. Okay. So, um. Give us a sense of how many, uh, how many shows you've produced for, uh, for those platforms. Then if, say, co-produce or let's say I co-produce or I work in platforms, that's a roughly not much, roughly 35 short [00:05:00] dramas.

That's including Right. The ones I work in the platform. Okay. Still sounds quite a lot. 35, that's a lot, lot of production and uh, and those have all pretty much been produced in China? Yes, yes. It's our Chinese short dramas. Yeah. Okay. So tell us more about the. The Short Drama Alliance then, because that is an organization that, that you've set up, give us a sense of, you know, what, what the alliance is and what its aims are.

Yes, so why I set up this alliance that was backed, backed by a year ago when I was still working in a short drum platform based in Wuhan. So at that time I used to work as a platform producer and 'cause my previous boss. Uh, he wants to earn money overseas. That's basically what he wants. So, because I study overseas, he asked me whether I would just [00:06:00] to in charge, uh, a new department.

It's like overseas department. I say, okay. And after I start to reuse my linking, because Lincoln is the platform. When I graduate from overseas, I used that to looking for jobs. So I reused that and I found out a lot of people approach me to ask me a lot of questions about Chinese short drama ecosystem, how to make money and um, how to write scripts and what the business is.

So I found out there is a lot information gap between China overseas. So that's why after I create my job, I decided to launch this alliance. One of the thing we do is to bridge the gap. So I will personally, I'll write some articles introducing what happened in China, explain the whole ecosystem and might be the future, is because China's about, uh, at least two years ahead of overseas.

So what's happening in China is likely happen overseas. [00:07:00] Yeah, absolutely. Well, I, I think, you know, uh, we can say we are, we are sat in the uk, but certainly we know how the US has been watching this, you know, explosion of psychodrama coming from. China and, you know, laterally, the UK's starting to wake up as well and it's incredibly sophisticated market now.

So, but we don't, you know, we don't really talk too much about what the market looks like within China, so, so can you tell us a little bit about what China's short form drama? Market looks like right now in terms of scale, in terms of territories within China and how mature the market is? Yes, actually I was, I just read reports from Data Eye of 2025, annual report of Chinese short drama market and there was, it was really surprised me, uh, the market size, it's already reached 13.8 billion US dollar in [00:08:00] Chinese markets only.

So it's nearly twice of the Chinese Cinema Box office in 2025. And in 2024 it just surpassed the Chinese and Box office, and last year it was like twice of the box office. So I think one of the reason is the growth of AI motion comics. It contributes to a lot. So it was. Before, um, it was estimated in 2025, the income of Chinese short drum is around eight to around 8 billion US dollar.

And the report shows that it's way, way higher than they what they estimated. Yeah. So, um, and, and, and you say that's mainly down to ai. Uh, driven animation based upon like graphic novels and, and comics. It's called ai, we call it ai, motion comics. Basically. They're still short drums, but they're made of ai, AI [00:09:00] generates images.

It's, uh, okay. But it is, the source of material isn't necessarily like graphic novels and everything. It could be anything. Uh, the source. N normally that's original stories or adapted from some ips. Most of them are original stories. Okay. Okay. So we are really talking about, you know, purely AI driven and created drama series that purely ai, those are the ones that are really starting to scale now.

Yes, that's purely AI generated, like short dramas. Interesting and, and obviously people have adopted it. People seem to love that. Love, uh, love that and don't have any pushback in terms of the fact that it's AI driven and AI created. There doesn't seem to be any issue with that at all. I think AI motion comics will take part of the market from live action short dramas, but mostly I think what they were taking is for audio books.

Some people, they listen audio [00:10:00] books, but for AI motion comics, they can listen and watch at the same time. So I think they'll take part of the market from audio books. Interesting. Okay. So give us a sense then of, uh, you, you've covered what sort of scale, obviously huge market and, uh, exceeding. Box office in terms of the territories within China and the level of maturity that this market has reached so far, how, how are you viewing it?

Uh, wow. It's, it's, the market's very mature from platform production companies, script writing studios, film based, uh, we call filming base or, yeah, filming base and post-production companies. Everything is very mature. So well, I, it was like, it must, it was mature, at least I would say two years ago. It's completely mature and competitive market and I, what I view is, um, [00:11:00] I think the market was still grow.

It haven't reached to the top yet, although that's already 70% of our audience, like Chinese are watching micro dramas. But I think the market will still grow. It haven't reached to the top yet. Okay. That's, I, you know, it is fascinating, really exciting and you know, real pointer for the rest of the world.

That's, you know, that's following in this trend. And you know, we see in a lot of Western territories, a lot of the bigger. Traditional media companies getting involved. We've seen Fox in investing in this area, and we can imagine there's gonna be well-known actors and, uh, and more sort of premium productions starting to roll out.

Are you seeing some of the better known actors and, and talent getting involved in short drama, or as you say, is it, is it really the, the AI. Created content, uh, within drama series that that seems to be [00:12:00] most popular. Uh, still action, like life action, short drama. Still the mainstream. I was just saying AI motion coms are growing.

The market's growing, so the, our, I can be as high as four to five for some heat. Heat, ai, motion comics. But it doesn't exist in live action short drums anymore. But it's still the mainstream live action those performed by access. Yeah, and they are some top short drum access. We do see some, some access from film and tv.

They switch their career from film to uh, short dramas and some of them become the top stars. That's what we see also, uh, we've, we've received some like film directors or film executive directors, or some famous film actress, one famous film actress. She actually played a lead [00:13:00] role in short drama, but it doesn't, uh, it's not a guarantee of a success.

There is some. There is a famous actress, she's about almost 80 years old. She's as famous as Mary Strip in states, and she just think it's fun, uh, short drama. So she, I think she invest, she at least she executive produce and play a leading role in a short drama, but that short drum didn't perform well, so their fem can.

Bring viewers to the short drama, but what really make the people stay is the story itself. So maybe, I think her stories still have some improvement in accountant, but yeah, that's what I see. Fascinating. Well, uh, just coming back to monetization really, or starting with monetization and, and coming back to platforms.

You, you said that the, that it's not necessarily. The short form drama apps that are [00:14:00] dominant there. We know about Drama Box and real short, and there's many, many more on the international market. But you are saying essentially the the main outlets for short drama and the places to access those are basically within the main networking.

Social media apps like TikTok are You mean China? Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I need to explain that. So in China, you can launch any apps you want, but the thing is no one is using that. We are just very used to WeChat. It's like a powerful version of WhatsApp. So we got all kinds of extensions in it. For example, if I go to Starbucks, I order a Starbucks, right?

I scan using WeChat to scan the QR codes and it just pop up an extension, a Starbucks extension so I can place the order. So that's exactly the same. We just used to use that. So no one's using another app. So that's the thing in China. So that's why like Rio, let's say Drama Box, the mother company of Drama [00:15:00] box is djo.

DJO is Chinese company. And so when they, when they are in China, they have to rely on Chinese TikTok doing right. But when they go, went overseas, they launch their own app because they have, they can have their users, uh, stay in their own app. In other than, uh, rely on zoning. But because, you know, in China, domain is the main traffic source.

So, so that's the reality. Okay, understood. So when it comes to monetization then, is it purely advertising driven or is it subscription based or Gives a, gives a sense of how producers are making money, creating short form drama when it comes to the social, uh, video apps in China. Um. Okay, so before 2023, that's mainly IAP, which means in-app purchase, which means the users [00:16:00] have to pay to unlock.

That's what I described. Mini Progress Theater. When they watch an ad and they click, they enter the theater. Right. That's IAP and yeah, about less than two years ago, I think that's two years ago. Homeschool, that's another app launched by Biden's. And they use this i a A model, which means in-app advertisement you can watch short drama for free, and the advertisers are placing, are paying for this.

So that's another complete different model. And if you ask me, producers are making money from that. Uh, it depends on the, it's belong to the platform producer or independent producer. So, yeah, that's a tough price. So if platform producer as I was that we just have the minimum like salary plus bonus, that's it.

The platform where platform makes money and profits. But [00:17:00] for independent producer, it depends. For example, right now overseas, most production are still fully founded by the platforms, which means they only got. Just make their profits and they don't have any copyrights, those independent producers. So they're just deliver the accountant according to the platform's requirement.

And that's it. Of course, they'll make their own money or profits, but um, yeah, they still, the copyright, everything's still owned by platform. So why do you think the. The whole micro drama industry has scaled so fast in, in China. And what parts of that do you think are transferable for global markets?

Give us a sense of, you said, you know, China's a couple of years ahead of the rest of the, uh, of. Rest of the world in this space. Give us a sense of why you think it's been so popular in China and also what we might expect to see in the rest of the world in micro drama in the coming year or two. [00:18:00] Yes. Uh, that's a good question actually.

I think, uh, China Shore drama didn't come out of nowhere. It's come from web novels. So we have almost 30 years of web novel writing history, and we have, uh, a lot of web novel ips. So for I think 42 million webinar novel ips. So yeah, so it's almost 30 years. So, uh, we actually export those webinar novels globally long time ago just because words are very hard to translate.

To translate then videos, I think short drama is. Kind of a video version of web novel, a more structured video enhanced version of web novel. So it's people can, yeah, people know short drama because videos are easy to translate. Why China? This short drum explo in China? They got several [00:19:00] reasons. One is China is a huge market.

We got 1.3 billion people in total, and it's kind of like one unified market. And, uh, we share the same, mostly same language and uh, almost the same cultural background. So that's one of the big reason why short drama was able to scale so fast in China. And, uh, the second reason is I think it's exploded.

One, it's because it, during the pandemic, because people are, you know, some people are staying at home, they don't know, they, they have nothing to do, so they watch, uh, dramas and they're willing to pay for that. Also, actually, short drum exploring in China, the first. Target audience is middle aged men. It's not like overseas.

That's women. No, it's complete. No, that's middle aged men during the pandemic. So I think they find a blank market because in China, uh, a lot of long streaming like TV series, they're [00:20:00] all romance stories or even modern romance stories or ancient modern stories Of those pretty girls, pretty boys, so middle age men are not very fancy of those stories.

So I think short drama finds a blank market and they target the middle-aged man and in some rural areas or in some countrysides. Or they target, let's say delivery guys or some stay at home nannies or cleaning ladies. They have fragmented time and they, you know, they just want to watch the short dramas.

So actually they, I think, short drama find a blank market in overseas as well. This storytelling, they find the blame market as well in in states or in Europe. They find the romance is underestimated. So I think they find, um, this storytelling find another blank market in states. Uh, yeah, I think that's another reason.

Yeah, we, we've been discussing micro drama a few times on the, on telecast recently, and it, yeah, [00:21:00] it seems like this is huge untapped market of people willing to pay micropayments. Uh, you know, that not being a barrier, obviously everyone's got a phone and so. They don't need any sort of other more expensive subscription.

It can be something that's, you know, relatively low cost and people that are time poor and may be a little bit lonely in some cases as well. Yes, I think, I think that's one of the reason I think short drum is, uh, emotional product. When, when I introduce how to ride short drums, I say you need to play with the audience in motion.

And see what they want, what they lack of what they want. For example, romance stories. Those women, they all want for, uh, Hansen and they, those kind of guys, they're taking care of them. You know, those kind of perfect husband. So I think maybe that's why CEO romance stories were popular in Western countries.

Yeah, they're like modern fairytales really, aren't they? Yeah, exactly. Short drum is the, it's like adult fairytales [00:22:00] actually. Yeah. Yeah. So what do you think the biggest misunderstandings there are when, when, when it comes to Western producers? Who are all getting into the market for the first time. From your standpoint, you've obviously seen the market explode within China, be incredibly successful and seeing this market mature, and you're obviously speaking at lots of events around the world.

When you are discussing micro drama with Western producers and media organizations, what do you think the biggest. Misunderstandings that they still have about micro drama? Uh, actually there are a lot of biggest misunderstandings. So one of them, the first one is I feel like in China as well. A lot of people from film and TV backgrounds, they don't watch short dramas or they just watch a few episodes and they think they understand that format and they think it's easy to produce.

I think that's. The [00:23:00] biggest mistake they have. Actually, I would argue that short drummer writing is not easy. I never use the, this word easy to describe this format. It's not easy to write. It's really, it depends on different people. And the second misunderstanding is some people just think our short drummer just vertical format and cut into pieces, and that's it.

Some people say, can, can I, I have a film or tv, can I just cut it vertically? And, uh, it's just like cut into pieces, add into pieces. Can I just treat it a short drummer? I never seen this any successful example in Chinese market. We, in China, we produce 100 shows every single day. So I've never seen that one successful case.

So that's, uh, another misunderstanding. And the third I think is, I think a lot of. Film and TV producers or directors, they still treat short drama with their artistic mindset. But actually [00:24:00] it's, um, it's uh, instead of a product mindset. So I think when you produce this short drama, you just treat it as a product.

Use the product mindset. And when you sell the product to somebody, you need to understand what they want instead of like, instead of what you want, what you, how you want to design this product. Yeah. So that's, uh, another misunderstanding I would say. That's really interesting actually. And that's another theme that we've sort of touched on on telecast quite a lot.

Not only. When it comes to micro drums, but digital content as a whole, you know, a lot of TV and film producers are sort of, they're perhaps they don't approach as a product. They're approaching it as art. Now that's, you know, that's, that's rightly or wrongly, this particular sector is product first, as you say.

So, uh, if you're gonna get involved in it, you have to play by the rules. Understand what, what motivates people to watch and, and sit within that. Adapt [00:25:00] to that format, right? Rather than trying to perhaps be, uh, a little bit too artistic. If you like it, it has to sit within a commercial framework and that includes the content, right?

Yes. Um, I actually, when I describe this, I still describe as a fast moving consumer goods. So you can treat it like h and m, right? Or you can design it as a cost. COS, that's a brand, but uh, you don't do it. You don't design short drum as a Chanel because Chanel is for very niche market. It's another different market.

So, uh, yeah. So I think when you design a short drum product, we say, uh, we treat it as a product. Still think about your audience, for example, in China, most of them are still. In, uh, small cities or rural areas. So we will think what they want, what they really care about. For example, like middle-aged men, middle-aged women, let's say she, she has a [00:26:00] family, right?

What she care about is in China. She might have this conflict between mother and daughter in law, right? That's typical Chinese thing. Or, uh, she might think about her job or her husband or her kids. That's what she really care about instead of like. Instead of telling a story of a huge found, you know, like Wall Street Tycoon, those kind of story.

Uh, I don't think those, let's say Chinese women will be interested in 'cause not, that's not what they really want. Yeah. It's got to be relatable essentially. Yes. Relatable. So that's why, if it's relatable to them, that's why when they see these ads, those algorithm push to them and they intend to click.

And intend to pay for that, if that makes sense. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. So looking ahead then, when, when to, you know, maybe two, three years, uh, in the future, you know, what trends do you see [00:27:00] emerging in the Chinese micro drama market at the moment that you think will have a global impact in, in the coming couple of years?

In different markets. One thing is for sure is from IEP to IEA in-app purchase to in advertisement that's 100% short like guarantee. So before in Chinese web novel era, it's switched from IEP to I as well. So short drama followed the same path, and I believe overseas was full at same path as well. Um, right now in the United States, it's not that competitive.

People are still willing to pay, so it's still IAP in that purchase. But I would say in the very near future, they will when the markets. Become more mature and more competitive and like there are more shows for the audience to choose and they will switch. They gradually switch to I A A. I think that's the trend.

And also you [00:28:00] asked me about two to three years actually. In my predictions, probably we don't see two to three years. I would just see one year, I believe one year later, uh, short drama will explode in two countries. One is India, the other is United States. That's my prediction. And you think, presumably if the model is really changing to i a A, then do we see the distribution method for this becoming more social network based rather than closed app based in, uh, on the global market?

If it's rich into RAA, there'll still be different apps. Like they might be promoted in different social medias, as you said. And people are downloading those apps. Those apps were like the mini TV in your films and you can watch them for free. Mm-hmm. And um, the thing is, um, well, I actually want to share with you, [00:29:00] like TikTok just launched Pine Drama in US only and iOS only.

Yeah. So this is completely ad free. This short drama app, 'cause TikTok is built in an ecosystem in China. This IA app is called Hong Kong. So when you watch, uh, short dramas about 10 episodes, they'll just have a one advertisement, and if you click the advertisement, it will redirect you into Chinese version of TikTok.

Where you can place the order there. So it's completely an ecosystem and business ecosystem it was viewed. So if you, if overseas, need to build that ecosystem, uh, one is depend on TikTok. TikTok has their advantage. The other, if other apps viewed that at least you need to have a lot of followers or users in your app, right?

Otherwise, how can you capture them placed? Order in your app. Well, uh, win-win. Thank you so much for joining [00:30:00] us. Now we're gonna move on to, uh, story of the week. What's your story of the week, right? Yeah, actually before I wrote three stories, but I want to share the most interesting one. So, um, I was in Dubai a few weeks ago and attend an event there.

So I met the head of the Dubai market for a Chinese company. And, um, we, we sat down and, uh, talk a little bit about short drama. He's not from the short drama business, so, uh, he told me a story. So he said earlier when he was scrolling her Chinese version of TikTok, so he came across a short drama and he clicked in.

So when he hit the paywall, it was around, uh, US dollar, about $8. At that time, it was 2025 and a while later, so he quit. He didn't pay. So, and while later doin pushed the same drama to him again. And this song was like, you have dollar $5. But, uh, [00:31:00] he still didn't pay and he keep scrolling other videos. And later on this same show, show again is worth about only less than $1.

So he hesitated for a while, but uh, he said, no, I'm not going to pay for that. So he just quit. And a while later, the same show just pushed to him again. And this time it was free, but you need to unlock by an ad. The ad was a long ad, so I was joking within. Mm-hmm. So maybe the algorithm think, oh, $10, no $5, still no $1.

You don't pay just $1? No. Okay. Maybe this guy is broke, so I would just push him and loan ads. So that's the, that's the story I want. Tohu. Interesting. Well that's, uh, and that what we can see obviously AI developing in terms of, uh, uh, funneling the consumer through the various different options. So that's, that's really, really [00:32:00] interesting.

Well, we'll keep our eye out for those techniques coming through, uh, globally in the coming year or two. Well win-win. Thank you so much for joining. It's been fascinating chatting with you. And, uh, what's next for the, uh, short Drama Alliance? What's. What's the next thing on your horizon? One is I about to revise my book for the second version.

The other thing we is, we are going to prepare the third of our online forum, so basically our interview, different vertical creators, and we will host our online forum. Basically it's just a zoom section. I would just wanna keep it simple. Uh, I normally interview around 20 creators in vertical. Area before, like, like directors, script writers, platform founders will interview them and edit together into our round table and play during the section our invite those creators if they are available at that time.

So that's it. [00:33:00] That's our online forum. That's what I'm preparing. Okay, fantastic. And, and can people join that for free or how, how do people access that? Well, I'm still designing this, so be last time normally is you share on your social media. So because I want to this inventive spread more people know about you, share on the social media, it had the print screen and send it to our, uh, official email.

And you fill off our Google phone too, so I know who you are. That's it. So I will give you an access. Access Zoom link. That's it. Or you can, you know, I put a price on it. Some people are just willing to pay. So that's two options. But we prefer the first one. Okay. Maybe, I'm not sure. I'm not sure. It's too complicated.

Yes. Or not yet? Well, maybe if people just follow you on LinkedIn at, uh, when, when hand, that's when, when hand. Then I'm sure they'd be able to follow along And, uh. And get all the information from your [00:34:00] LinkedIn page. Yes. Thank you. Win-win. Thank you again for joining. It's been fascinating speaking with you.

I'm sure we'll, uh, we'll chat again on telecast at some point and, uh, the best of luck with everything and, uh, thank you very much for speaking to us. Okay, thank you very much. Well, that's about it for this week's telecast. I hope you enjoyed it. This week's telecast was produced by me. We'll be back next week with another show.

Until then, stay safe.