Can microdramas move from social trend to big business?

The rapid rise of microdramas in India was the focus of a recent discussion on Media Dialogues, a CNBC-TV18 platform that brings together industry leaders to examine structural shifts in media and entertainment. The conversation featured Saurabh Pandey, founder of Story TV; Neha Markanda, chief business officer at ShareChat; and Naveen Kadyan, head of product at Zupee Studio, who outlined how ultra-short vertical storytelling is evolving from a social media trend into a meaningful business category.

India’s digital entertainment market is being reshaped by the emergence of microdramas—high-intensity, vertically shot fictional series that are moving swiftly from novelty to commercial scale. Inspired initially by Chinese and Korean formats, the genre has, in roughly a year, developed into a structured ecosystem that industry estimates place at close to $500 million.

Unlike many previous digital video trends, the momentum is not being driven primarily by metropolitan audiences. Consumption is being led by viewers in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, where vernacular microdramas are attracting sustained attention and, notably, early willingness to pay. What began as recycled clips on platforms like Instagram and YouTube has evolved into original, locally produced storytelling designed specifically for Indian consumption habits.

Internationally, the model is already well established. In China, microdramas generate billions of dollars annually, surpassing traditional box office revenues. India remains at an earlier stage, but the underlying dynamics appear familiar. The category’s growth has been closely tied to the country’s smartphone-first behaviour. With hundreds of millions of users accustomed to vertical video, short episodic storytelling has become intuitive rather than experimental.

Microdramas typically consist of episodes lasting one to two minutes, stitched together into tightly paced narratives that can be consumed in short bursts throughout the day. A full season often runs little more than an hour in total viewing time, encouraging repeated engagement rather than long, uninterrupted sessions. The result is a form of entertainment optimised for instant escapism and habitual viewing.

Non-metro India sits at the centre of this shift. A majority of consumption is coming from smaller towns and cities, where audiences are gravitating toward content in regional languages. Action, romance and aspirational storylines—particularly those rooted in local settings—have emerged as dominant genres. Viewers are not just sampling these stories; many are returning multiple times a day and spending close to an hour with the format.

For platforms, this combination of scale and depth of engagement is unusual in a digital media environment often forced to trade one for the other. That dynamic has sharpened the focus on monetisation. The key question is whether microdramas can transition from free, advertising-led consumption to paid models that are both sustainable and scalable.

Early indicators suggest cautious optimism. Engagement patterns resemble those seen in mobile gaming, with high-intensity storytelling keeping viewers closely involved. Industry executives argue that the true test of monetisation is not high price points, but whether users are willing to make even small payments. Crossing that psychological threshold, they believe, signals long-term viability.

As brands, creators and production houses begin to align around the format, the sector is moving from experimentation toward commercialisation. Microdramas are no longer being treated as a peripheral trend. With a sizeable market already forming, strong adoption beyond the metros and initial success with micro-payments, the format is emerging as one of the fastest-growing segments of India’s digital entertainment economy—one that investors and platforms are increasingly compelled to take seriously.