Emily is a college student by day, but she works the night shift at the strip club to pay her tuition \u2014 she doesn\u2019t think anyone will find out her secret, until one day, her mysterious English teacher shows up! Did he recognize her? Will her secret get out? Pay 60 \u201ctokens\u201d to see what happens next, or you can watch an ad, or\u2026 just buy a VIP pass for $20 per week and skip the ads altogether.<\/p>\n
These stories are pulpy and exaggerated, bursting with cringeworthy acting and writing. Yet these \u201cmicrodramas\u201d \u2014 TikTok-like shows with episodes about a minute long \u2014 are making billions of dollars a year.<\/p>\n
First popular in China, microdrama apps are poised to have a breakout year in the U.S. app market. According to the app intelligence firm Appfigures, ReelShort reached roughly $1.2 billion in gross consumer spending in 2025, up 119% from 2024; another leading app, DramaBox, made $276 million in gross consumer spending last year, more than doubling its 2024 numbers.<\/p>\n
The market doesn\u2019t appear to be slowing down. TikTok just launched its own standalone microdrama app called PineDrama, and a new app from Hollywood veterans called GammaTime just raised $14 million, including checks from angel investors like Alexis Ohanian, Kris Jenner, and Kim Kardashian.\u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s surprising to see short-form, scripted drama apps achieve such success when we\u2019re only five years removed from the implosion of Quibi. Quibi wanted to be like Netflix, but with 10-minute episodes that were designed to be watched on the go. Founded by Dreamworks co-founder and former Disney chair Jeffrey Katzenberg, Quibi raised more than $1.75 billion in funding from major Hollywood studios, then created shows with stars like Liam Hemsworth, Reese Witherspoon, and Anna Kendrick.<\/p>\n No one wanted Quibi, and the app turned into a punchline because of how massively it flopped. But ReelShort \u2013- an app whose top shows are called \u201cMy Sister Is the Warlord Queen\u201d and \u201cIn Love with a Single Farmer-Daddy\u201d \u2013- is a hit.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHow are they succeeding where Quibi failed? They\u2019re basically OnlyFans for the female gaze,\u201d Eric Wei, creator economy expert and CEO of Karat Financial, told TechCrunch. \u201cThey do romantasy, where the titles are all like, \u2018My Alpha.\u2019 This is like \u201850 Shades of Grey,\u2019 but for vertical video.\u201d<\/p>\n OnlyFans isn\u2019t the best comparison (these shows can be suggestive, though not pornographic), but Wei is right that sex sells. When a story seems like it might be heating up, you\u2019ll be prompted to watch ads or pay money to keep going. But the payoff is never that compelling, so you keep watching, only to see another pop-up asking for more money, or other ambiguous in-app currency.<\/p>\n The business model behind these apps replicates the same dark patterns as mobile games. They\u2019re designed to get users hooked on free content, giving out free in-app currency for logging in each day. As people spend more time on the app \u2014 which is designed to be addictive \u2014 they need more coins or tokens to unlock more episodes of a show, but there\u2019s no way to earn enough to get their fix without shelling out real money.<\/p>\n Sometimes a microdrama is interactive, allowing viewers to choose which route the story will take \u2014 but the good option (the woman stands up to her abusive ex) will cost tokens, while the less satisfying one (the abusive ex faces no consequences for his actions) is free.<\/p>\n Soon, a hooked viewer may relent and pay for the weekly $20 ad-free pass, which, after a month, would cost more than subscriptions to HBO Max, Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, and Paramount Plus combined.<\/p>\n As AI enters the picture, these companies will churn out content at an even more alarming pace. LLMs are not capable of writing prestige dramas like HBO\u2019s \u201cSuccession,\u201d or even a sitcom like \u201cThe Big Bang Theory,\u201d but the most successful microdramas are so predictable and formulaic that they don\u2019t actually require much human wit and creativity. You\u2019d be shocked to learn how many microdramas begin with a scene in which a girl with glasses gets pushed down by a mean classmate, only to be saved by some popular jock, who notices she\u2019s actually really pretty if she just takes off her glasses.<\/p>\n PocketFM, the Lightspeed-backed audio-series platform, has already embraced AI. Last year, it released a tool it calls CoPilot, which was trained on thousands of hours of content to understand the \u201cbeats\u201d of a formulaic story, helping writers add cliffhangers or plot twists to their stories that it predicts will make audiences want to watch more. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian company Holywater, which raised $22 million to fund its microdrama app My Drama, calls itself an \u201cAI-first entertainment network.\u201d<\/p>\n While microdrama could fully go the way of AI, Dhar Mann Studios CEO Sean Atkins thinks there\u2019s also an opportunity for creators.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThink about it \u2014 short-form is a little less overhead than long-form, and vertical is even less overhead,\u201d Atkins told TechCrunch. \u201cI think you\u2019ll see a handful of creators start going into that pretty significantly, particularly since they have the experience of low-cost production.\u201d<\/p>\n These companies have a great business model on their hands. But it\u2019s one that thrives on short attention spans, in-app purchases, and content that feels like \u201cCocomelon\u201d for adults.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Screenshot-2026-01-23-at-10.12.43-AM.png?w=680\")