AI short dramas create the myth of wealth. Can ordinary people divide the money?

Recently, if you swipe Douyin or video numbers, there is a high probability that you have seen AI comics-the pictures are generated by AI, the characters can move and speak, and the plot is bloody and popular,"I was an emperor in ancient times" and "I was reborn" It's the villain.

This thing will be very popular in 2026. How popular is it? The myth that "ordinary people earn millions a month through AI short dramas" and "3000 yuan can make 500 million broadcasts" is so popular that a group of people are starting to sell "crash courses on AI short dramas". The training camp cost 1999 yuan a year. It is crowded with people who want to start a sideline business.

It took me some time to peel this air vent from beginning to end. Data, cases, costs, benefits, and pits are looked at one by one.

Let's put the conclusion here first-this air outlet is real, and the tool threshold is really lowered to the floor, but "ordinary people can make a fortune by closing their eyes and entering the game" is false. Truth is much crueler than myth.

Let's talk slowly next.

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First, let's talk about how big this air outlet is

This part of the data is real and not bogus.

According to data jointly released by DataEye Research Institute and Huge Engine, the domestic AI comics market will reach 16.8 billion yuan in 2025. The forecast for 2026 is that the caliber of 36 krypton will reach 24 billion, and the caliber of the Douyin giant engine will be 22 billion-no matter which caliber, it will be an increase of several billion.

The user scale is also huge. According to DataEye data, there will be approximately 120 million AI comics users in 2025, and it is expected to increase to 280 million in 2026. More than doubled in a year.

The most telling thing is the Spring Festival. DataEye statistics show that the total number of short dramas during the Spring Festival in 2026 will be 8.67 billion, of which AI comics account for nearly 30%. You should know that a year ago, AI comics were still a scrap, but now they directly account for 30% of the Spring Festival broadcasts.

Therefore, the word "tuyere" is true. Money is pouring into this pool, users are pouring into this pool, and the platform is throwing resources into this pool. There is no moisture at this point.

Why did ## suddenly become popular? Because costs have collapsed

When an industry suddenly breaks out, there must be a critical point to be broken through. The critical point of AI short dramas is the cliff-like drop in production costs.

Look at this cost curve--

In 2024, the one-minute production cost of AI comics will be close to 15,000 yuan. At that time, the AI video model was still very popular, and the generated characters were transformed every move, frame by frame, which was ridiculously expensive.

By 2025, with the advancement of AI video models from generation to generation, the cost per minute will drop to more than 1,000 yuan.

It has dropped more than ten times.

The biggest turning point was before the Spring Festival this year, when ByteDance released Seedance 2.0, a video generation model. This model's image quality, movement consistency, and physical realism were directly evaluated by the industry as "AIGC is over from childhood." Immediately after, the fast-moving Keling 3.0 followed suit.

When these two models came out, they were equivalent to giving the entire industry an admission ticket for "creative equality"-in the past, you had to be a rich and skilled team to make AI videos, but now a sideline party, a small team of three or five people, can do it by yourself.

Supporting one-stop tools have also come out. There are already platforms on the market that integrate the entire process from "script to camera splitting, video to filming". When you import a script, it automatically splits the camera, automatically generates pictures, and automatically produces films. In theory, an ordinary person who doesn't understand editing or special effects can go through the entire process.

This is the technical basis of the statement that "everyone can make AI short dramas." This foundation is real.

But that's exactly the problem-the threshold is lowered to the floor, which means everyone can come in. Everyone can come in, which means that this place will soon become a Red Sea.

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, the most famous myth of wealth creation, how was it broken

When it comes to AI short dramas creating wealth, the case of "Huo Qubing" cannot be avoided. It is the loudest cannon in the entire tuyere, and it is also the most valuable sample to take apart.

On the evening of March 7 this year, a topic hit the hot search-"Three people make AI short dramas with 500 million views in 48 hours." It is about an AI short drama called "Huo Qubing". It has 80 episodes. Director Yang Hanhan has never done film and television before. The team has only three people, including her, and it only took 48 hours and less than 3000 yuan to make a hit that exceeded 500 million yuan for broadcast across the Internet.

This story is so exciting. Zero foundation, 3 people, 48 hours, 3000 yuan, 500 million playback-every number says,"Ordinary people come in, you can do it."

Then the director came out and clarified himself.

Yang Hanhan said a few things on her social account: 3000 yuan is just the cost of computing power, excluding other costs such as labor; the team has nearly 20 people (there are only 3 online legends); there is no 80-episode "Huo Qubing", only two short films lasting more than 4 minutes and 6 minutes;"48 hours" does not include eating and sleeping, but just pure working hours. As for the 500 million views, she said that her source also came from the media, and she herself could not accurately count this data.

Compare the clarified version with the mythical version--

Three people became nearly 20 people. 3000 yuan has been reduced from "total cost" to "just computing power fee." The 80 episodes turned into two short films of a few minutes. The 500 million views were broadcast, and even the parties themselves dared not recognize it.

This myth is basically empty.

What's more worth talking about is the platform it uses. The "Huo Qubing" team uses the "Nano Comic Drama Assembly Line", which is an AI Comic Drama production platform launched by 360 Group. The actual controller is Zhou Hongyi. A carefully packaged and widely spread "myth of making wealth by ordinary people" naturally points to a specific production platform after it becomes popular. The logical chain in between is yours.

The role of the myth of creating wealth has always been to make you believe that you can get rich, and then pay for this "belief"-buy points, open members, and sign up for courses.

now puts out the coldest number

If I were to use only one number to illustrate the true difficulty of the AI short drama, I would use this--

DataEye data: In 2025, 60946 comics were launched, with a hit rate of only 0.16%.

What is the concept of 0.16%? Among the more than 60,000 units, only a hundred can become a hit. More than 60% of the works have less than 1 million views-and less than 1 million views are basically not making money.

The real form of this industry is that a very small number of leaders consume most of the traffic and revenue, leaving thousands of works to be lost.

This is two completely opposite pictures to "ordinary people can make money by entering the game with their eyes closed."

Add a few equally cold facts--

One is that the real money is the platform, and the creators are just the suppliers. A senior executive from a leading AI short drama company said directly that it is the platform that makes money in this industry, and the content side is essentially a "content provider." The platform grasps computing power and traffic distribution rights, and transfers all trial and error costs, time costs, and monetization risks to downstream creators.

Second, monetization still relies on "purchase volume" and profits are thin. AI short dramas have not stepped out of the old path of "spending money first to monetize it." The ROI of industry purchase volume can only stabilize between 1.05 and 1.2-investing 100 yuan to earn 105 to 120 yuan. After excluding other costs, there is basically nothing left. Even for top companies, only about 20% of the series are profitable.

Three, the computing power is still in line. After Seed 2.0 became popular, the most commonly used AI, i-Dream, was crowded out, and the generated videos often lined up for hours. If you want to produce more films, you will be stuck just in line.

Four, courses on cutting leeks are flying all over the place. A bunch of accounts are selling AI short drama courses that are "zero-based and quick" and "cash you can learn", each set of hundreds to thousands of yuan, and a large number of training camps costing 1999 yuan a year. What these classes sell is anxiety.

Can ordinary people still enter the game

I don't want to do the kind of "it's all a trap, don't touch it" to persuade the party to resign. It's not objective. There are indeed opportunities in this outlet, but the opportunities are not in the direction pointed out by the myth. I give three solid judgments.

First, whether you can enter or not depends on what you want. If you are aiming for "getting rich quickly", there is a high probability that you will be harvested, because the 0.16% hot money rate is there, and you are not the 0.16%. If you want to "learn a craft of AI content production," then now is a good time to join the game-mature tools, many tutorials, and low trial and error costs. This craft will only become more and more valuable in the next few years. These are two completely different attitudes towards entering the game, which determine two completely different outcomes.

Second, if you want to try it, try it with free tools and don't pay tuition first. Jimeng, Keling, and bean buns all have free quotas. You can make a few free items first to see if you feel this way and if the market has any reaction. If you pay 1999 to report to the training camp first, the order is reversed-you should first verify whether you can do it before deciding whether to invest, rather than paying first.

Third, the core barrier is not in tools, but in "content judgment." AI has eliminated the threshold for "image generation", which means that this matter is no longer a barrier. When everyone can generate pictures, whether you can make blockbuster movies depends on whether you can tell stories, understand the emotions of the audience, and whether you can grasp it and feel better. These AI can't give you, you have to have it yourself. This is precisely the most counter-intuitive part of the AI era-the stronger the tool, the more valuable human judgment is.

Last

The AI short drama is a story of "ordinary people relying on AI sideline to make wealth."

Digging down one layer has reduced the cost of AI video models by more than tenfold in two years, pushing the threshold for content production to the floor, and indeed bringing a wave of "creative equality."

Digging further down, once the threshold is lowered to the point where everyone can enter, this place will immediately become a red sea-more than 60,000 works are crowded in, with a hit rate of 0.16%. What makes money is the platform that holds computing power and traffic, not the creator who is immersed in making content.

Digging further down, you will find that every seamlessly packaged wealth creation myth-3 people, 48 hours, 3000 yuan, 500 million plays-is almost empty when taken apart. The purpose of their existence is to Let you believe that you can make money, and then pay for that belief.

This is not a script unique to AI short dramas. This is a script that will be repeated every time the technology trend is around-the most stable thing to make in the gold rush is selling shovels, and the most stable thing to make in the AI short drama craze is selling computing power, traffic, and courses.

But then again, the matter of technological equality itself is true and good. An ordinary person can now really make a decent video content at a very low cost, which was unimaginable three years ago.

Opportunities are real, myths are false.

What you have to do is to go for real opportunities, not false myths.

People who go for craftsmanship can get real things in this wave. People who go for quick wealth will likely become the ones under the scythe of others.

These two types of people use the same set of tools and have completely different outcomes.

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