In early 2026, the tides of the short drama industry completely shifted. The short drama giant Hongguo, which once attracted countless production companies with its "base payment + profit sharing" model, recently announced adjustments to its base production mechanism. Although Douyin Group Vice President Li Liang responded that the company would continue to increase investment, the cold winds in the market were hard to ignore. A large number of live-action short drama projects have been stalled due to the loss of base funding, and the once bustling shooting bases are now deserted. The short drama circle is experiencing an unprecedented "trimming fat and increasing muscle."

From "human acting" to "computing power acting": AI becomes a safe haven

At the same time as the live-action short drama market shrinks, AI live-action dramas has entered its "crazy era." With the commercial launch of Seedance 2.0 from ByteDance, the originally high production costs have been instantly broken.

A set of core data reveals the essence of this transformation:

  • Cost drops sharply: A live-action short drama can cost up to 400,000 to 500,000 yuan, while an AI live-action drama only costs 120,000 to 150,000 yuan, and batch production can even be compressed to less than 50,000 yuan.

  • Efficiency soars: Traditionally, a few people working together take weeks, but now with tools like Seedance 2.0, the production cycle has been shortened by five times, and the industry has entered a period of explosive growth with over a thousand productions per month.

Thousands of times the production capacity: a trend or over-competition?

Faced with Hongguo's policy shift, many leading companies such as Fengxing Culture, which created "Wushuang," have started to fully shift to AI short dramas. The industry no longer speaks of "directors" constantly, but instead promotes "AI talents of super individuals." In the eyes of these players, AI is not only a tool for cost reduction and efficiency improvement, but also an opportunity to break through false prosperity and return to the "script-centered system."

However, the rapid growth hides serious concerns. Although the technology has made AI short dramas almost indistinguishable from real ones, user resistance still exists. Moreover, when the production capacity increases by thousands of times, the revenue sharing amounts are also greatly diluted. Many animation drama companies received significantly reduced revenue shares in January and have already begun to quietly leave, or like Chen Xing's AI short drama company, have decisively moved into overseas markets to seek higher profits.

The second half of the short drama: script king or technology domination?

2026 is destined to be remembered as the "year AI replaced short drama actors." When the production threshold has been lowered to the point where one person and an AI tool can make a film, the competition logic of short dramas has been completely restructured.

In this "thousands of times production capacity" survival battle, simply piling up numbers may only bring meager returns. As an industry veteran said, 80% of hits are still determined by the script structure. AI is just giving everyone an entry ticket, and what truly retains users might still be the story that best touches the heart and understands human desires.