Vertical Observer: microdrama and vertical-drama industry news and data

The vertical-drama business, sourced
UPDATED 28 October 2026 224 REPORTS · 172 COMPANIES

News

Developments in the vertical-drama business, newest first. Each entry states what happened, who reported it, and on what basis the figures rest. Select a headline to read the full report and its sources.

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  1. New Short Media wraps horror-comedy shot as vertical series and feature
  2. Kristen Brancaccio to direct microdrama and feature versions of Summer Session
  3. French platform JLA Play adds about 30 DramaBox series
  4. Fox and Endemol Shine develop scripted Fear Factor microseries for My Drama
  5. Former Neighbours cast object to AI-assisted vertical recut
  6. RisingJoy plans 30 AI-assisted vertical anime titles by early 2027
  7. KiKA and MDR to release two vertical Schloss Einstein spin-offs
  8. France's Vertival competition sets finalist announcement for 15 November
  9. Bravo commissions first scripted microdrama for Peacock
  10. Sony Pictures TV signs creator Thea Von Engelbrechten, launches animated microseries
  11. Sensor Tower: South Korean short-drama app revenue hit a record in August
  12. Minivela takes a stake in Latin American microdrama producer Red Minds Films
  13. Issa Rae's Parental Advisory, a third Hoorae TikTok microseries, premieres 28 October
  14. EiLiN says its subscription will cost under €15; RTLZWEI plans 60 vertical episodes
  15. EESC adopts opinion on the Digital Fairness Act; Commission date tentatively 11 November
  16. China's broadcast regulator sets a 500-title microdrama target in its five-year plan
  17. TF1's Barjac Production enters vertical drama with two series
  18. Korai Flix agrees $3.5bn SPAC merger with APEX Tech Acquisition
  19. Ahoj-Brause releases seven-part vertical Halloween microdrama
  20. ReelShort and Wattpad add two more vertical series from Wattpad stories
  21. Owl & Co.: two-thirds of Q3 vertical drama releases outside China were AI generated
  22. Dutch producer Every Media has seven microdramas in development
  23. SAG-AFTRA verticals agreement reaches one year with dozens of productions approved
  24. Mediacorp launches Love Angels, a 20-episode shoppertainment microdrama
  25. Bavaria Fiction and Engizek Films shoot film and vertical series together
  26. Orange brings ReelShort to Max it TV in 17 African and Middle Eastern markets
  27. TikTok and Made By Us Studios set creator-led microseries slate
  28. Bundestag committee hears experts on German streaming investment obligation
  29. Omdia finds men account for 54% of UK microdrama users
  30. Fox Entertainment takes first look on Hartbeat vertical series

All reports, by month and topic

Background

What the vertical-drama category is, how large it is on the available evidence, and where the numbers disagree. Standing reference, revised as new measurement is published.

Companies

Platforms, studios and incumbents active in vertical drama. Select any entry for its reported figures, with their basis and source where known. Where a company's own claim and an independent estimate disagree, both are shown.

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Capital

Funding rounds, strategic investments and the public filings behind them. Filing digests link to the original document.

Regulation

The instruments that bear on vertical-drama platforms, by jurisdiction: what each requires, where it applies, and what remains unsettled. This page describes the state of the rules. It is not legal advice.

Data

The underlying tables: market size and volume, country measurement, rankings and Europe market by market. Rows carry their source and period where one is published. Figures from different bases are not comparable — see the note below.

Reading the numbers. Three different quantities circulate in this category and are routinely conflated: app-store consumer spend (gross, before platform commission), in-app-purchase net revenue, and company revenue as reported in filings. They are not interchangeable. Neither are China-inclusive and ex-China totals: a figure's scope changes its meaning. Where vendors disagree, the spread is shown rather than resolved.
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About

What this site is, how it is compiled, and what its labels mean.

Vertical Observer is an independent record of the vertical-drama industry — the short, phone-native, serialised drama format that grew out of Chinese duanju and now runs as a global app business. It covers the platforms, their economics, the capital moving into the category, the regulation forming around it, and what is actually known about the audience.

The category moves quickly, most of its operators are private, its largest market reports in Chinese, and figures from vendors measuring different things are quoted interchangeably. This site keeps a dated, attributed record of it.

How figures are labelled

Figures carry the basis they rest on wherever the record names one, because in this category the basis is often the whole story:

official
From a regulatory filing, a government body, a court, or an industry association. The strongest class of evidence here — and the rarest, because most operators are private.
estimate
A third-party research vendor's measurement or projection. The vendor is named wherever the source identifies it, because vendors measure different quantities by different methods and their figures frequently disagree.
company
Disclosed by a company about itself and not independently confirmed. Carried because it is on the record, not because it is verified.
reported
Reported by a named news outlet, and traceable to neither a filing, a research vendor, nor the company itself. Common in this category, where deal terms and private valuations reach the press before they reach a document.

Method

Sources are surveyed daily: regulatory publications and filings, vendor research, company disclosures, and the trade press in English, German and Chinese. Material is dated to the original release rather than to a later pickup — a national newspaper writing up a vendor report in September does not make it a September figure.

Reports and company profiles list the sources they were compiled from wherever the record names them, and a company figure with no stated basis is marked as such rather than given one. Where two credible sources disagree, both are shown. Where the evidence stops, the page says so rather than closing the gap by inference.

What this site does not do

It carries no advertising and no sponsored placement, and it does not give investment, legal or commercial advice. It reports what is known and says who says so.

Who publishes it

Vertical Observer is published by Colibri Holdings Ltd. Its editor is Tobias Jaeger, who built the site and edits its guides, data tables and regulation tracker. It takes no money from the companies it covers and has no commercial relationship with any of them.

Colibri Holdings Ltd is registered in England and Wales, company number 09741137, at 71 Queen Victoria Street, London EC4V 4BE, United Kingdom. Editorial questions and corrections: corrections@verticalobserver.com. Privacy: privacy@verticalobserver.com.

Corrections

Errors are corrected on the record rather than quietly amended: each correction is noted on the page it changes and listed on the corrections page. If you find one — a mis-stated figure, a wrong attribution, a company profile that has gone out of date — please write to corrections@verticalobserver.com.

Copyright

Headlines, quotations and figures remain the property of their publishers and are cited with their source, linked where the source is online. This site is a reference and index, not a republishing service.