How much does it cost to make an AI micro drama?

Our prices

Four ways to pay, each as on the pricing page:

• Episode 1: $1 one-time. One 30-second episode of your own show at 480p, with captions.
• Micro drama: $49 one-time. Ten 30-second episodes at 480p, same cast, Episode 1 included. A new show is another $49.
• Monthly, $49 a month: up to 300 seconds at 480p or 150 at 720p, enough for one micro drama of ten episodes.
• Monthly, $149 a month: up to 1,200 seconds at 480p or 600 at 720p, up to four micro dramas.

What you pay for: seconds of finished video

The unit is the second of finished video. Video, pictures and voices share the same credits, and 720p uses them twice as fast as 480p, which is why every monthly plan lists half as many seconds at 720p. Resolution is chosen once for the whole series.

On a monthly plan you split the seconds any way you like, as long as each episode stays at 60 seconds or less, with up to eight characters and eight locations in a show. Ten 30-second episodes use 300 seconds; twenty 15-second episodes use the same.

You see every price first

Nothing paid runs until you say yes to it. First you see the season plan and the full episode 1 script with the price of casting plus episode 1. After that, each episode's script comes with its price in video seconds, and you can change any line before you approve. Once an episode is queued for filming its script is locked, and a change becomes a new episode.

What drives the cost of any AI micro drama

Whatever tool you use, a few things decide what a season costs:

• Total seconds: the number of episodes times their length. A 10-episode season of 25-second episodes is a different budget from 20 episodes of a minute.
• Resolution: higher resolution usually costs more per second.
• Retakes: on tools that charge per generation, every attempt at a shot that does not work costs too.
• Your own time: writing, keeping faces consistent and editing clips into episodes. A tool that plans the season and keeps the cast fixed saves most of that.

Comparing makers

Most AI drama makers price their plans in credits or coins, and a credit buys a different amount of video on each tool, so prices do not compare one to one. Read each maker's own pricing page and work out what one finished episode costs there.

From their own pages, read on November 3, 2026: OpenArt sells per-seat plans with monthly credits (https://openart.ai/suite/pricing); Topview sells plans with credits, billed annually (https://www.topview.ai/pricing); PopShort sells monthly or annual plans in PopCoins (https://popshort.ai/en/pricing); Pippit sells yearly plans with credits (https://www.pippit.ai/pricing?lang=en); Drma sells weekly, monthly and annual plans and credit packs in its App Store listing; EpNova lists in-app purchases without prices on its Play Store listing.

Compared with a studio shoot

A studio micro drama needs actors, a crew and locations for every season, and every reshoot brings them back. With AI the cast and the sets are made once and reused, so the cost of the season is the seconds you film. Our own dramas run 21 to 28 seconds an episode, so a ten-episode season fits in about 250 seconds.

Refund

If you have not filmed an episode within 7 days, your first payment is refunded in full.

What one 21-second episode looks like

Last Delivery, episode 1. Vera gives Leo ten minutes to deliver an envelope, and the receipt names him as the thief. Twenty-one seconds, two actors, one prop: about what one 30-second episode at 480p buys, with seconds to spare.

Questions