AI short dramas have exploded in popularity, and competition in the Agent space has also begun to intensify.

Back in 2023, AI and short dramas were two industries that seemed barely related to each other.

An AI content entrepreneur recalled to Jiemian News that at that time, few people in the market actually combined the two: people working on AI looked down on short dramas, while those producing short dramas had no knowledge of AI. Even after AI penetrated relatively mature content sectors such as advertising and film & television, short dramas still did not become a mainstream scenario in the eyes of tech entrepreneurs.

Now this gap has almost disappeared. From the end of last year to after the Spring Festival, along with technological improvements and adjustments to platform policies, a large number of content producers have started to enter the "AI short drama" track. Data released by China Netcasting Services Association shows that in the second quarter of 2026, a total of 239,000 micro short dramas were launched domestically, including 86,000 live-action dramas and 153,000 AI-generated dramas.

While the popularity of AI short dramas continues to rise, another competition has already begun: from startups to large model vendors, the number of players in the short drama Agent track is growing rapidly. Statistics from industry media show that in April this year, there were more than 20 Agents on the market specially designed for AI short dramas, while the number was only 4 at the end of 2025.

Products from major manufacturers such as ByteDance's Skylark AI, iQiyi's Nado Pro, and SenseTime's Seko have entered the market one after another. Entrepreneurs from ByteDance and Moonshot AI have also joined this field, giving rise to a surge of independent Agent companies.

AI short drama itself is a complex and specific content production scenario: from script understanding and character design to storyboarding, image and video generation, and then to editing and distribution, almost every link can be intervened by AI.

However, what major manufacturers and startups value is by no means only the short drama market itself. As the business scope of this sector continues to expand, short drama Agent has become another sample of competition at the AI application layer.

Opportunities Beyond Large Models

As a company that entered the AI short drama market back in 2021, Jingying Technology has successively released video models and independent AI short drama platforms in recent years. Lin Junkai, CFO of Jingying Technology, said in an interview with Jiemian News that if AI in the content creation industry only focuses on "reducing costs and increasing efficiency", it will inevitably end up in the predicament of homogenization.

This is also the current situation that most short drama Agent manufacturers are aware of.

At present, short drama Agents on the market are all evolving from single-point generation tools to full-process production. For example, the Skylark AI short drama Agent launched in March this year can automatically complete story blueprint drafting, character design and storyboard generation; iQiyi's Nado Pro integrates agents for screenwriting, directing, art design, editing, promotion and distribution into the same film and television production platform.

Not long ago, the "Short Drama Studio" launched by Jimeng AI also integrated the whole process including script sorting, character and scene management, storyboard generation, video production and post-adjustment into the same platform.

In actual operation, a creator often uses multiple Agents and tools to produce AI short dramas.

A short drama director told Jiemian News that in her current workflow, both large models and self-developed Agents of the team are involved: text large models are used alternately for script writing, lines and storyboard prompt words; domestic video generation models are the main force for video generation; the team's self-developed Agent workbench is used to connect processes for links such as batch processing of opening and closing frames, and finally humans are responsible for aesthetic judgment and rework decisions.

In fact, in the short drama Agent track, the relationship between players is also very delicate. They are not completely in a competitive relationship: for example, the AI video creation Agent "Seko" launched by SenseTime supports access to SenseTime's self-developed models, and also supports third-party models; independent Agent companies will compete with some large platforms for creators, but there may also be cooperation opportunities.

In the fast-growing AI short drama market, there is still much room for development beyond large models.

Zhang Wan, head of Seko products, believes that vertical scenario Agents always have segmented space to provide deeper services for users on the basis of foundational models.

She cited an example that a certain studio previously used other competing products, which could also complete script uploading, character extraction and storyboard decomposition, but many links still required manual confirmation, and even needed to manually associate art assets in the prompt words, which actually did not save much manpower. Seko hopes to hand over these pre-preparation tasks to Agents, so that users only need to conduct final review and modification at the finished film stage.

Seko has also begun to extend its services to links beyond production. Some overseas short drama teams can learn about overseas popular content trends through Seko's skills, and even carry out overseas distribution and operation with the assistance of Seko.

The Agent developed by Jingying Technology tries to allow creators to complete all work in the same system, which includes content creation, evaluation and feedback, forming a complete closed loop.

Especially at the evaluation level, Jingying Technology hopes to use AI to help creators judge the effect of short dramas, and solve the problems of homogenization and decreasing hit rate. Lin Junkai believes that this is the core competitiveness of Agents.

However, whether it is large manufacturers or startups, the opportunities they value are not just short dramas themselves, but the significance of short dramas for "testing" Agent capabilities.

Lin Junkai prefers to regard AI short dramas as an entry point for AI to enter the content and entertainment industry. He told Jiemian News that traditional short dramas belong to passive consumption, where users watch passively; games are active consumption, where users can participate directly. As AI is able to understand content, generate content, and further interact with users, these two originally separate fields may gradually converge.

Image source: Jiemian Image Library

"If we only look at the prospect of short dramas 'reducing costs and increasing efficiency', people working on AI may still look down on this track. The key point is that short dramas will become a content consumption entry." This is why Jingying Technology takes short dramas as the preferred scenario for Agents.

Seko also does not want to be defined as an "exclusive tool for AI short dramas". Zhang Wan believes that after tools are combined with creators, new technologies may incubate new content forms that did not exist before.

Fighting for Creators

As content demand continues to grow, two major trends have emerged in the short drama Agent market: one is to compete for full-process functions, and the other is to compete on price.

The aforementioned AI short drama director told Jiemian News that compared with two years ago, there are more and more short drama Agents or tools on the market. The quotation for single generation is indeed decreasing, and there are low-price options. At the same time, tools have evolved from single-point functions to full-process coverage: script, storyboard, image and video creation are all packaged into a "short drama studio", and Agents can connect a large part of the workflow.

However, with the rapid iteration of large models, short drama Agent manufacturers still face the crisis of being "swallowed up".

The advantages of large model manufacturers lie in their technology, computing power, products and distribution channels, while independent Agent companies can hardly compete head-on with large manufacturers in underlying models or traffic entrances, so they need to build barriers at other levels.

Lin Junkai believes that many current AI tools are only responsible for content generation, but how a piece of content performs after release has little to do with the tool itself. If an Agent can know whether a short drama has been watched to the end, at which node users drop off, and which content eventually becomes a hit, and then use these results to influence the next round of content production, then it can truly participate in short drama creation.

Integrating these capabilities into Agents is not just a technical issue. A trend is that creators have begun to become the core resource contested by short drama Agents.

This year, SenseTime has launched an AI micro-short drama creation incubation base in Xuhui, Shanghai, which mainly helps creators with computing power, tools and resource docking. This is one of the ways to attract creators to join the ecosystem. Zhang Wan told Jiemian News that for tool-based products, users attach great importance to the usage experience, and the migration cost is very high. Once the platform has continuous, long-term paying users, their loyalty will be extremely high. In addition, creators will precipitate assets on Seko that can be reused later.

At present, Seko mainly generates revenue through the subscription model, but the team also provides technical and financial support for some potential creators, and participates in the production and distribution of the works themselves. "The Magic Treasure Basin", a hit work on Hongguo Short Drama this year, is an AI comic drama jointly launched by the content producer Chen Ke Studio and Seko.

Jingying Technology's judgment is more straightforward.

Lin Junkai believes that creators are one of the most important resources in the current AI content industry. They do not pursue a large number of creators, but sign creators through two-way selection, and carry out commercial cooperation in the form of "minimum guarantee plus revenue sharing". Under this model, creators continue to produce content on the platform, and data and feedback will also be precipitated, further optimizing the functions of the Agent.

Two relatively typical commercialization paths have emerged for short drama Agents. One is to follow the mainstream tool route, where the platform obtains revenue through user subscriptions; the other is the content route, where Agent companies maintain close cooperative relationships with creators.

As for which way can bring a more stable business model, there is no standard answer yet. The subscription revenue model is relatively lighter and more mainstream, but it will face the problems of falling model prices and product homogenization; the content route has greater imagination space, but it has the risks of high investment and betting on hit works.

The aforementioned AI content entrepreneur told Jiemian News that at this stage, many Agents are still fighting price wars and grabbing users at low prices. He believes that this will only lead to more shoddy works on the market, and as model capabilities become more mature, the profit margin left for tool products will become even smaller.

At the same time, creators still face many unsolved dilemmas. The aforementioned AI short drama director said that this year, their actual cost of producing short dramas is 5 to 10 times that of last year, because the volume, number of episodes, image quality standards and rework volume have all increased. What is cheap is only "single generation", and the computing power and manpower for repeated screening and repeated rendering have not been saved at all.

She believes that tools are getting cheaper and there is no end to chasing them. What really makes the difference is aesthetic judgment and content selection. Whether Agents can help creators at this level may be the key to the next stage of elimination round.

This article is from "Jiemian News", reporter: SHE Xiaochen, editor: WEN Shuqi, authorized for release by 36Kr.