Actors in microdramas now ask for AI language in their contracts. The SAG-AFTRA verticals contract gives them one. Three uses of their work fall outside what it can reach. All articles
Vertical Drama is the editorial reference for the new format that's rewriting television: 90-second episodes, shot in portrait, watched in pockets. We track 4,374 titles across DramaBox, ReelShort and a dozen other apps — with a weekly chart, talent indices and platform intelligence.
A free booklet on how vertical drama works, where the money goes and what China just changed, with dated references.
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A vertical drama that explains vertical dramas. 1 min 33, in English.
Watch on YouTube (opens in a new tab)Actors in microdramas now ask for AI language in their contracts. The SAG-AFTRA verticals contract gives them one. Three uses of their work fall outside what it can reach.
Nine episodes in two weeks, on an ADSL line that uploads at 4.4 KB/s. Episode 1 is below, and so is the bill.
Three LGBTQ+ series outside Asia and the West reached the screen by three different routes. Costs from $10,000 to $46,000, several ways of shooting and very different makers say the door is open to any community.
Reporting and analysis on vertical drama, by Ludovic Bostral.
| № | Series | Platform | Genre | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 |
The Great and Powerful Genie
|
ReelShort | Paranormal | — |
| 02 |
A Lifetime Pact Buried In Sorrow
|
DramaWave | Drama | — |
| 03 |
Swapped to Be the Don's Queen
|
GoodShort | Drama | — |
| 04 |
His Love Arrived On Time
|
FlareFlow | Time Travel | — |
| 05 |
Help Mommy, Daddy's Killing Me in Surgery!
|
FlareFlow | Revenge Thriller | — |
| 06 |
HORROR GAME: SEDUCE MY GHOST TEACHER OR DIE
|
NetShort | Drama | — |
| 07 |
Too Late to Beg: The Fat Heiress's Revenge
|
FlareFlow | Revenge Thriller | — |
| 08 |
Step Back! Im the Hidden King
|
DramaBox | Drama | — |
| 09 |
Mating Season: Luna Trials
|
DramaWave | Drama | — |
| 10 |
The Alpha and His Nanny Luna
|
ReelShort | Werewolf Mate | — |
Listings, talent indexes, market sizing, platform economics — the proprietary work behind this site is produced by Streaming Radar and published in two places.
Tuesday mornings, 7am UTC. Deals, debuts, and demographic shifts our editors think actually moved the format.
The full deck on the format: market sizing, platform economics, talent rosters, country-by-country forecasts.
A serialized fiction format filmed and watched in 9:16 portrait, designed for smartphone consumption. Episodes typically run 60 to 120 seconds; seasons run 60 to 120 micro-episodes. Also called shorts drama, mini-drama, microdrama. Distinct from creator-led TikTok serials in production budget, length, and monetization.
The format crystallized in China between 2018 and 2021 as 短剧 (duǎnjù, "short drama"), evolved on Kuaishou and Douyin, then migrated West in 2022 via ReelShort. It descends, simultaneously, from the Chinese web novel, the Brazilian telenovela, and the Korean web drama — squeezed through the constraints of a phone screen.
Most platforms make episodes 1–10 free, then charge $0.30 to $0.99 per micro-episode, payable in coins purchased in bundles. A typical 80-episode series earns $40 to $90 from a fully-watching viewer. Average production cost: $200K–$450K per series. A top-10 hit grosses $5M–$30M.
An episode runs 60–120 seconds. A season runs 60 to 120 episodes — 1.5 to 4 hours total. The running time of a feature, distributed across three to four sittings of binge-scrolling, typically over 48 hours.
Romance dominates: CEO Romance, Werewolf Mate, Secret Baby, Mafia Romance, Forbidden Romance, Fated Marriage. Revenge thrillers and reincarnation/time-travel make up most of the rest. Common thread: high-stakes emotional conflict, fast resolution, a cliffhanger every 90 seconds.
Shoots are fast: a typical 80-episode series films in 10 to 14 days, often in a single rented house or office. Crews are 15–25 people. Pages-per-day are unusually high. Most actors are American, Australian, or British — selected by casting directors operating out of Los Angeles, London, and Sydney.
Globally, women aged 25–55 are the majority of paying viewers. The format over-indexes on suburban and small-city audiences in the US and on tier-2/3 cities in China, India, and Brazil. Median session: 31 minutes — 15 to 20 micro-episodes in a single sitting.
DramaBox, ReelShort, ShortMax, GoodShort account for the majority of global revenue. FlexTV, MoboReels (India), Kalos Box (Korea), and a long tail of regional players make up the rest. Few are profitable in every market; most are profitable in two or three.
Both are used interchangeably. "Vertical drama" emphasizes the format (9:16 portrait); "short drama" emphasizes the length. We prefer vertical drama because the orientation is the more durable distinguishing feature — short-form video is a much broader category that includes news, sketch, and creator content.
TikTok serial fiction shares the orientation but differs in production model, budget, and monetization. Vertical drama is professionally cast, scripted, lit, and graded; episode releases are scheduled; and platforms charge per episode. TikTok serials are creator-funded and ad-monetized.
Global vertical-drama revenue: $11 billion in 2025 and $14 billion in 2026 (Omdia). Omdia's end-2030 forecast, relayed by the Digital Entertainment Group on 26 February 2026, is more than $22 billion.
Vertical Drama is an independent editorial reference for the format: rankings, a multi-thousand-title catalogue, talent and platform indexes, country-by-country market view, and weekly Streaming Radar intelligence. We are not a streaming service. We are not affiliated with any platform. We are read by the people who make the deals.
The format named by the length of its episodes. Both spellings circulate, and sources often use them interchangeably. Micro-drama apps, compared
The Chinese term, literally "short drama". NRTA Order No. 16 defines it by episodes of under twenty minutes. The Chinese market
We aggregate publicly-listed view counts and ratings across DramaBox, ReelShort and a dozen other apps, cross-referenced with public industry signals and the Vertical Invasion 2026 research base (Omdia, Deloitte, Sensor Tower, Real Reel). Country and platform-level economics are sourced from the report and updated quarterly. The public sources we follow are credited with direct links in the weekly Radar and at the foot of this page.
No. Vertical Drama is published independently by Bostral & Co. We carry no platform advertising on the editorial pages. Streaming Radar is funded by paid subscribers; the Vertical Invasion report is sold direct.
Yes. The Streaming Lens MCP exposes the underlying data to subscribers — series, actors, country market sizing, platform stats. Single-user reports start at 7 500 €. Enterprise licenses (data feed + report) at 299 €/month. Email [email protected].
The list is a rolling weekly cross-source view of consumer views and public industry signals. Older hits drop off; smaller-platform exclusives are weighted by audited audience size. If you think a series is genuinely under-counted, write to [email protected].
Eligibility is wider than coverage, and the honest answer is the second one. Any platform above 1 million verified MAU qualifies for the catalogue and the country charts — but what we actually hold is deep on DramaBox and ReelShort and thin everywhere else, the remaining apps each represented by a handful of titles. Read anything outside the two leaders as a sample, not a census; the exact split is computed at build time on the statistics page. We don't cover individual TikTok or Instagram serials at present, but we track creator-funded vertical drama on Patreon and Substack via the Streaming Radar.
Please. Attribution to "Vertical Drama (verticaldrama.tv)" is appreciated. The editor takes scheduled background calls. Email [email protected].
Our editorial tracking cross-references public industry rankings and blogs. We credit them and link straight back — we hold no access to their paid platforms.