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China’s micro-short drama industry is seeing explosive global growth, marked by the Chinese term “duanju” officially becoming a dedicated English word for the genre. Overseas encyclopedia entries and search volume for "duanju" have soared since late 2024.

According to the Report on the Innovative Development of Global Micro-Short Dramas Driven by AI, the global market reached $18 billion in 2025. China accounts for nearly 78% of the global total, while Chinese companies command approximately 90% of the market outside China. Chinese firms now run over 80% of the top 50 revenue-generating overseas short drama apps, led by pioneers like ReelShort, DramaWave, and iDrama.

This success stems from efficient localized production. Early player Crazy Maple Studio relies on target-market talent for scripts, acting, and shooting, combined with China's mature production framework to meet global viewers' core emotional needs.

Meanwhile, AI tools are drastically boosting output efficiency. ByteDance’s video generation model, Seedance 2.0, now generates half of its revenue and API calls from overseas. By leveraging AI agents across script creation, visual generation, dubbing, and editing, a 6-person team can boost monthly output from 1 to 5 episodes, cutting total production costs per minute from 1,000 yuan to 400 yuan.