Love, lies, angry ghosts: Indians are bingeing on two-minute dramas

Every week, Neeta Bhojwani spends hours binge-watching dramas about wealthy men pretending to be poor and angry ghosts out for revenge.

The shows run into more than 50 episodes, each under two minutes – micro-dramas, as they are called, are bits of snackable fictional content, designed to be watched on mobile phones during snatched moments in the day. They are hugely popular in China, the US, South Korea and now India.

Bhojwani, a homemaker in western Udaipur city, says she first got hooked on micro-dramas when an ad popped up on her Instagram feed. She now watches them regularly, buying yearly subscriptions on platforms such as Story TV.

“Watching these is such a great way to pass time,” the 36-year-old says.

Bhojwani is among millions of Indians across big cities and small towns avidly watching micro-dramas, which mostly have cliched plots and exaggerated acting styles similar to Hindi TV soaps. A typical plot could have a down-on-his-luck young man meeting a friendly genie or a couple from different classes defying all odds and melodrama to marry.

The market for these is booming in India – it’s currently worth $300m (£222m) and projected to reach $4.5bn by 2030, according to a report by investment firm Lumikai, which calls micro-dramas the country’s “fastest growing entertainment format”.

They started picking up steam in India in 2024, with homegrown start-ups such as Kuku and Reelies which found audiences usually through social media advertisements. But until recently, they were still considered a fad, and not part of the mainstream.