Zhihu, Douyue, Xiaohongshu: How Far Can Short Dramas Drive the Web Novel Business?
When "one IP, multiple adaptations" becomes the norm for short dramas using IPs, and the formula of popular actors is repeatedly applied, while the cost of original creation is prohibitively high, the rapidly developing short drama industry has reached a crossroads at the source of content. With its overwhelming IP reserves, Fanqie Fiction has become the largest "water source" at present. However, the rapid consumption of IPs and the serious homogenization are forcing the short drama industry to look for the next potential "reservoir."
Against the backdrop of the urgent need for high-quality IP sources in short dramas and comic dramas, Zhihu's Yanyan Stories, Douban Reading, and Xiaohongshu, three platforms with distinct temperaments but all focusing on online literature, each have their own unique "IP pools." However, they also face the huge challenge of being difficult to adapt from text communities to the film and television industry.
From the different paths, potential, and risks of these three platforms in "reviving" through short dramas, we can see who truly has the ability to relieve the "content hunger" of short dramas and who has the potential to be a new "IP source." Among Zhihu's Yanyan Stories, Douban Reading, and Xiaohongshu, which one is becoming an important IP incubator to supplement the differentiated content of Fanqie Fiction?
Can Zhihu's "Yanyan Stories" Achieve Commercial Success?
Among all the platforms trying to "extend their lives" through short dramas, Zhihu is the most determined and under the greatest financial pressure.
According to Zhihu's first-quarter performance report for 2026, Zhihu's revenue in Q1 was 652 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 10.70% and a quarter-on-quarter increase of 1.3%. The net loss was 8.504 million yuan, a year-on-year narrowing of the loss by 15.75%. However, the adjusted net profit was 17.16 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 147.2%, and a quarter-on-quarter turnaround from loss to profit.
Based on an observation of the business structure, it can be found that Zhihu's revenue from paid content and IP operations was 402 million yuan, accounting for 61.7% of the total revenue; the revenue from marketing services was 191 million yuan, accounting for 29.4%; and other revenue was 57.8 million yuan, accounting for 8.9%. Thus, Zhihu's paid content and IP operations remain its core revenue pillars.
Yanyan Stories is an original short story reading platform launched by Zhihu on March 15, 2023, and officially announced on May 18 of the same year. It originated from the Zhihu community and is positioned as a native short story platform, focusing on providing high-quality content that can be read in 10 - 20 minutes, covering more than 180 categories such as romance, suspense, science fiction, and real-life emotions. The rise of Yanyan Stories is essentially a "precise collision" with traditional online literature routines. Although it cannot completely abandon the emotional frameworks such as "tragic love," "counterattack," and "sweet romance" that have been proven by the market, the platform has still incubated many IPs with adaptation value.
The Entertainment Value Officer found that many hit shows have emerged from Zhihu's IP adaptations. Among them, short dramas such as "Hiding the Beauty in the Golden House," "The King's Heart Is Like an Illness," "The Moon Never Sets," and "The Feast" have accumulated over 3 billion views across the network; AI comic dramas such as "The Tragic Cry of the Eldest Daughter" and "I'm Going Back to My Parents' Home" have reached 1 billion views across the network, and the results of IP adaptation are remarkable. Short dramas adapted from high-quality IPs such as "The Sheep and the Orchid" and "Listening to Silver" dominated the charts during the Spring Festival, proving that its top - tier content has strong market - detonating power. The high - quality hit route of "winning by quality," along with cases where individual authors' highest copyright income exceeded 2 million yuan, have all strongly attracted high - quality creators.
Zhihu also does not hide its layout of using AIGC technology. Zhihu's CFO, Wang Han, told the media that AI short dramas, comic dramas, and AI data are Zhihu's two major investment directions. The former is the AI - generated content that users are most willing to pay for, and the latter is to provide support for AI development.
Data from DataEye - ADX shows that from January to May this year, Yanyan Stories, with 251 AI dramas, had an associated incremental playback of up to 6.834 billion, ranking first in the industry by a large margin and being the copyright holder with the highest associated playback volume.
Image source: DataEye - ADX data
However, while AI comic dramas bring imagination space to Yanyan Stories, there is also great uncertainty. There is already a risk of content homogenization in the field of AI comic dramas, and the user acceptance of AI - generated content still lacks time verification. Therefore, AI comic dramas are not a reliable "lifesaving straw."
In addition, the biggest challenge for Zhihu's IP short drama adaptation lies in balancing the internal consumption between "high - quality" and "mass - produced" content. When AIGC quickly floods the market in an industrialized assembly - line manner, will the high - quality content that requires time to polish and condense more creative efforts depreciate?
The Entertainment Value Officer found that many authors in the author community expressed concerns about Zhihu's traffic. Especially regarding the unsatisfactory traffic and income of short stories, an author said in 2025, "Since August, I can't even get 20 likes at the beginning."
As a platform that serves as an IP "water source," Zhihu first needs to achieve continuous profitability by selling IPs. Otherwise, it will just be making wedding dresses for the short drama industry with its own IP sources. After the industry's dividend period ends and competition enters a deeper stage, will it rely on online literature to "extend its life"? Or will it accelerate its own consumption? This requires the wisdom of the management and a protection mechanism for excellent creators.
Can Douban Reading's Quality Reading Lead to a New Short Drama Track?
In 2023, Douban Reading stabilized its position in IP output due to the success of the adapted dramas "The Art of Affectation" and "The Nine Eighth - Grade Girls." Adapted from Yibei's serialized novel "Six Sisters" on Douban Reading, it achieved a top - ten ranking in the annual playback volume list. "On the Brink of Death" became a high - quality mystery drama on iQiyi, and "There Is a Red House Under the Tree" was the highest - rated youth drama in 2025. At the beginning of this year, two dramas adapted from Douban Reading IPs, "The Goddess Covers Her Eyes" and "The Invisible Name," both received scores of 7 or above on Douban.
In the film and television drama market, Douban has shown a stable output of IP sources, especially in the fields of realistic themes, female - oriented, youth, and suspense. According to statistics from Nandu Entertainment, as of now, Douban Reading has sold the film and television adaptation rights of more than 200 novels, nearly half of which are in the female and suspense categories. When audiences are tired of the unrealistic and sensational plots and long for immersive and realistic themes, the literary works on Douban Reading, which have long - term accumulated a focus on traditional film and television and quality reading, highlight their adaptability.
Douban Reading's popularity in the long - drama market naturally attracted the "olive branch" of the short drama industry. In April this year, Douban Reading's CEO, Dai Qin, revealed to the media that the film and television copyright revenue of Douban Reading accounted for more than half, and the price of long - drama adaptations of a single IP ranged from hundreds of thousands to millions of yuan. In the past few years, Douban Reading sold dozens of film and television copyrights a year. However, after the addition of short dramas this year, the number of copyright sales has increased to hundreds.
Public data shows that in the first two months of 2026 alone, Douban Reading has sold a total of 14 film and television copyrights, of which as many as 10 are short dramas. In particular, five micro - short dramas adapted from Douban Reading IPs, "Mandala," "The Yellow Sparrow Wind," "He Fell in Love with Her First," "Lucky Love," and "Neighbors in Love," filled the gap in the short drama industry's over - reliance on Fanqie Fiction. Taking the micro - short drama "Mandala" as an example, it achieved the "double - billion" achievement of a popularity value of over 100 million and a viewing volume of over 1 billion in four days after its launch on Hongguo Short Drama, setting a good start for Douban Reading IPs in the micro - short drama market.
Douban Reading's works have a natural "refreshing feeling," attracting many creators who prefer literary styles to publish novels. However, these fresh online novels may not all meet the adaptation requirements, so the traffic and income cannot meet the expectations of some authors. An author expressed dissatisfaction with the platform on social media, saying, "I don't know where else I can go besides Douban. I like to write suspense and have a bit of a literary youth complex. I've written three books, but there's no traffic. I've always wanted to leave, but I don't know where to go."
The executive vice - president of a leading short drama company told the Entertainment Value Officer that for short drama production companies, the value of Douban Reading lies in the "differentiation" and "scarcity" of its content. Although Douban Reading's works naturally have exclusivity and freshness, this industry insider also expressed his concerns. "Douban Reading's advantage is also its disadvantage. Its creative ecosystem is based on meticulous cultivation, and the production volume and update speed of its works cannot be compared with Fanqie Fiction, which produces thousands of works a day. However, the short drama industry competes for time windows on an hourly basis. Whether Douban Reading's slow and low - output IP supply model can keep up with the rapidly rotating flywheel of the short drama industry still needs time to observe."
Can Xiaohongshu's Community Emotions Precipitate into a New IP Treasure Trove?
Since 2024, Xiaohongshu has launched an online literature business. Although it was not a huge success, it still generated some popularity on the platform. In 2024, many authors were eager to try and wanted to take advantage of the first - wave traffic dividend on Xiaohongshu. However, feedback such as "no one reads" and "zero likes" gradually cooled and diminished the authors' enthusiasm for online literature creation.
In 2024, Xiaohongshu only carried out topic operations and traffic support for online literature. After seeing little effect in 2025, some authors found that Xiaohongshu started an internal test of online literature payment in January this year, aiming to solve the monetization problem. According to Jiemian News, Xiaohongshu's test charging methods mainly include three types: one is to pay for high - definition original image downloads; the second is to pay for single - article note reading, including long - story or novel notes. Creators can set a free trial - reading ratio (such as the first 20%), and readers can pay a fee (such as 9.9 yuan) to unlock the full text; the third is to pay to unlock note collections, mainly for serialized content.
Although a series of actions have been taken to attract online literature authors, the presence of online literature on Xiaohongshu is still not strong. Xixi, who has published works on Xiaohongshu, told the Entertainment Value Officer, I chose Xiaohongshu because the threshold is low, there is no need to sign a contract, and it's easy to gain followers in the early stage of publishing online literature. The data visualization of likes, comments, and follower growth is very exciting. However, discomfort soon emerged. Firstly, the long review time caused the traffic window period to pass after the article was released, resulting in a decline in reading data. In addition, because Xiaohongshu's page design is not suitable for reading long texts, in fact, real online literature fans are on platforms like Fanqie. So, instead of increasing, the number of followers decreased.
In January 2025, Xiaohongshu officially launched a short drama channel and entered this highly competitive market as a latecomer. It is precisely because of the intention to develop short dramas that Xiaohongshu has a greater need to cultivate its own online literature IPs and form a closed - loop IP chain.
After trying to cooperate with leading short drama production companies for platform distribution, Xiaohongshu quickly showed its ambition for self - produced content. Currently, there are 3 "exclusive short dramas" under the short drama section. In addition, through the "Red Mirror Short Drama Project" jointly initiated by the FIRST Film Festival and Xiaohongshu, two works launched by Xiaohongshu, "Online Tracking" and "The Snake," have attracted industry attention. After watching, the Entertainment Value Officer found that these two short dramas have distinct styles, high production thresholds, and diverse types.
