Insightrackr has released the October 2025 Global Short Drama App Download and Revenue Rankings based on its monitoring data of the global mobile market.
These rankings are derived from Insightrackr's proprietary estimates of app download volume and gross revenue, listing the Top 15 Short Drama Apps by Downloads and the Top 15 Short Drama Apps by Revenue. This report further deconstructs the user acquisition and ad creative strategies of selected standout apps from the past month.
This Month's Case Studies: Melolo, Pop Drama, Micro Drama
Top 15 Short Drama Apps by Downloads
In October, the short drama app market maintained a stable trajectory. ReelShort, DramaBox, and Kuku TV continued to dominate the top three positions, with month-over-month fluctuations contained within 20%.
Top Short Drama App Downloads – October 2025
Notably, DramaReels, which had significantly ramped up its advertising spend since mid-September, continued its strong growth trajectory. After achieving a 10x MoM increase in September (Click to Read), its downloads rose by another 80% in October, moving up to #4 in the rankings.
Pop Drama was the fastest-growing app this month, with downloads up over 60%, followed by Micro Drama, which saw an increase of around 55%.
In contrast, FlareFlow experienced a notable downturn, with downloads down 35.48% MoM. Since COL Group Co Ltd (Chinese: 中文在线) publicly confirmed its ownership of FlareFlow at the end of August, the app had surged in September; the October decline likely reflects a natural cooldown following earlier promotional campaigns.
Top 15 Short Drama Apps by Revenues
On the revenue side, ReelShort reclaimed the top spot with a 11.99% MoM increase, surpassing last month's leader, DramaBox.
Top Short Drama App Revenue – October 2025
Apps ranked 2nd to 9th showed moderate revenue fluctuations within 20%. Aside from DramaWave, which fell 17.01%, and RapidTV, which rose 11.89%, all others saw changes of less than 10%, indicating an overall stable market landscape.
The latter half of the list showed more volatility. Melolo, developed by ByteDance, recorded a 44.42% MoM increase, while DramaReels, from Skywork AI, achieved an impressive 151.60% surge, reflecting solid returns from its ongoing advertising investment.
Top Short Drama App UA Strategy Analysis
01 Melolo
According to Insightrackr data, Melolo's ad activity remained relatively steady, maintaining around 500 active ad creatives per day. Excluding Ad Library data, its main traffic sources were AdMob and TikTok.
Overview of Melolo’s Advertising Strategy and Creative Approach
Geographically, Southeast Asia remained Melolo's core target region, with Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand ranking as its top three markets.
Indonesia alone accounted for 60% of all ad creatives, making it the app's primary focus. The country also contributed 78.36% of total downloads and 84.22% of revenue in October.
In previous articles, Insightrackr identified two dominant creative approaches in the short drama genre:
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Story-driven immersive creatives: Long-form ads (typically 3+ minutes) that showcase dramatic climaxes or full episodes to engage deep-viewing audiences.
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Montage-style creatives: Fast-cut compilations of multiple hit shows, often enhanced with captions, pop-up text, and localized narration to emphasize the platform's rich content library and visual impact.
However, Melolo's new ad creatives took a distinctly different direction from these mainstream strategies.
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The Legend of A Bastard Son |
My Bestie Watches as My Prince Spoils Me |
Some ads targeting Indonesia featured local creators appearing on camera in vlog-style content, documenting daily life—such as work, cooking, and leisure—before showing themselves watching short dramas on Melolo during breaks.
This “short reel–like” presentation significantly reduced the overt sense of advertising, boosting authenticity and relatability and allowing the ads to blend seamlessly into users' feeds.
Meanwhile, Melolo also began experimenting with AI avatar creatives. Compared to earlier AI-based ads analyzed by Insightrackr, Melolo's latest versions showed substantial improvement in facial expression realism, lighting, lip-sync accuracy, and environmental fidelity. The enhanced realism of these digital avatars further increased ad engagement and watch time, signaling the growing practical adoption of AI technology in short drama advertising.
02 Pop Drama
According to Insightrackr data, Pop Drama launched on Google Play in May and began consistent ad campaigns by late June, gradually increasing its number of active ad creatives. Over the past six weeks, the app maintained 80–120 active creatives daily.
Facebook was its primary ad platform, with TikTok also contributing some traffic.
Overview of Pop Drama’s Advertising Strategy and Creative Approach
Pop Drama's ad distribution was highly diversified, with the U.S. accounting for only 3.76% of total creatives—indicating a globally targeted advertising strategy. Downloads primarily came from Indonesia, Brazil, and Mexico, while South Korea, Indonesia, and the U.S. generated the highest revenues.
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Popular Scenes |
Dikenler Arasında Aşk |
In October, Pop Drama heavily promoted a Chinese-translated series “Secrets of Blossom Valley (Chinese: 落花有泪犹带恨)”, which had first gained popularity in mainland China in May. By October, the show was introduced to multiple global markets.
Insightrackr detected its ad creatives in Indonesian, Portuguese, and Thai, most of which were long-form videos (3+ minutes) that leveraged ethnic costumes and cave legends to create a mystical, suspenseful appeal.
Notably, several other short drama apps—RapidTV, Soda Reels, Fun Drama, and Short Reels—also ran campaigns featuring the same show, underscoring its rapid global expansion momentum.
03 Micro Drama
Insightrackr data shows that Micro Drama significantly increased its ad activity since late September, with daily active ad creatives rising from about 130 to over 180, stabilizing between 160–200 through mid-October before briefly dipping, then surging again at month-end.
Overview of Micro Drama’s Advertising Strategy and Creative Approach
Excluding Facebook Ad Library data, Micro Drama also leveraged Kwai and Pangle as supplementary traffic sources. Its campaign footprint was globally diversified, though Southeast Asia and Latin America remained key markets for both downloads and revenue.
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Spanish Creative |
Portuguese Creative |
Starting mid-October, the app intensively promoted the Chinese-translated drama “Mistaken Identity, Fated Love (Chinese: 母凭子贵后被老板全家宠上天)”, with ad creatives available in English, Spanish, Japanese, and Traditional Chinese, suggesting a global expansion effort.
By late October, another translated series—“She's No Longer an ATM, His Family is in a Frenzy (提款机不当了，校草全家急疯了)”—saw a sharp increase in ad creatives, likely positioning it as November's key promotional title.
Interestingly, Insightrackr found that both shows were simultaneously advertised by multiple short drama apps, highlighting a growing trend of cross-platform collaboration and shared content promotion within the global short drama ecosystem.
As competition intensifies, deep regional market intelligence and the capacity for rapid creative iteration will be the ultimate differentiators.
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