Told one minute at a time, micro dramas are soap operas designed to fit in your hand

A new batch of apps promising to deliver romance, handsome billionaires and over-the-top storylines straight to your phone have knocked longtime favorites like YouTube and even Netflix from their top spots in the app stores.

They are called micro dramas — vertically filmed, under minute-long clips that together are often movie-length soap operas. But instead of waiting weeks to find out if Penny will wake up from her coma, or if Luke and Laura make it down the aisle, it takes just minutes for the plots of series like Fake Married to My Billionaire CEO, Return of the Abandoned Heiress and The Quarterback Next Door to unfold.

The libraries of micro drama apps like ReelShort, FlickReels and DramaBox contain hundreds of series chopped up into 60-second-long parts, set to play one after the next, continuously. Perfect for the short attention spans of social media users.

While the first few episodes are typically free to watch, once you want to see more, you’ll have to pay up — purchasing coins or passes from the apps to access additional content. That costs viewers $10 to $20 a week or up to $80 a month.

Instead of investing in A-list stars or blockbuster franchises, the companies behind these apps bank on little-known actors, tight budgets and accelerated production timelines to churn out content drawing in millions of viewers and dollars.

Popularity sparks competition and government scrutiny

Micro dramas initially rose to prominence in China during the COVID pandemic, and by 2023, they grew to a $5 billion industry.

They also faced increased scrutiny. Chinese media reports that between 2022 and 2023, government officials removed over 25,000 micro dramas for “violent, low-style or vulgar content” in an effort to tighten controls over content published online.

Simultaneously, micro drama apps in China experienced a stagnation in growth. Caiwei Chen, a tech reporter covering China for MIT Technology Review, says, “You could not achieve the growth that Chinese internet entrepreneurs were used to,” due to the number of micro drama apps flooding the market.

Government scrutiny and a crowded market pushed companies investing in micro dramas to expand abroad, where they hoped to duplicate their success in China with new audiences.

The profitability behind Queen Bees and Billionaires

Micro dramas dominate the entertainment charts across both Apple and Google’s app stores. ReelShort, DramaBox and DramaWave, three of the most popular apps, were downloaded 34 million times last month, grossing $78 million in revenue across Apple and Google, according to analytics firm Appfigures.

Women make up a majority of micro dramas’ fanbase. ReelShort’s parent company, Silicon Valley-based Crazy Maple Studio, said women comprise 70% of its 45 million monthly active users, half of whom are based in the U.S.

This includes 26-year-old writer Britton Copeland, who, after repeatedly seeing TikTok ads for the ReelShort series True Heiress vs. Fake Queen Bee, purchased a pass to finish the 85-part series.

“Despite the cheesy acting, the clip ended on a cliffhanger, and I desperately wanted to see what happened next,” Copeland said. “[I] ultimately decided I wanted to watch the entire film … so I poured a glass of wine and indulged in what I have determined is my generation’s soap opera.”

While Copeland wouldn’t describe the app as addicting, she said the stories can suck you in. “It’s a lot easier to lose track of time when you can consume hundreds of videos in half an hour versus watching essentially a full film.”

It’s a sentiment shared by actor Marc Herrmann, who’s starred in several micro dramas, including Billionaire CEO’s Secret Obsession and My Sugar-Coated Mafia Boss. He said the experience of watching a micro drama is different from sitting down to commit to watching a long film.

“The way these are broken down into the minute and minute-and-a-half episodes, it’s not requiring a lot of you to say, ‘I’ll watch this episode,'” Herrmann said. “And then the next thing you know, a half an hour or two hours went by, and you just watched a whole movie.”

The global micro drama extended universe

With micro dramas taking off in the U.S., the companies behind them are exploring new ways to expand their reach. A spokesperson for Crazy Maple Studio told NPR it’s begun reproducing some of ReelShort’s most popular English-language stories for other countries. The series are shot with different actors, and the scripts are adapted to represent different cultures.

So far, it’s been a success. The Spanish version of ReelShort’s hit series The Double Life of My Billionaire Husband has gained nearly half the 450 million views of the original English version. The Spanish and Japanese versions of its newest story, Breaking the Ice, have racked up over 10 million views each.

However, some, including Chen, wonder if micro dramas are just a trend. “I do worry about how soon people will get tired of it,” she said. “It’s competing with TikTok … It’s competing with Instagram and a lot of other stuff.”

And those other apps typically do not require users to spend cash or coins on passes to gain access to content. Only time will tell if the 90-second soap opera can outlast its hourlong daytime predecessor.