It starts with a swipe. A woman slaps her cheating husband. A man discovers he has 24 hours to live. A child uncovers a family secret. It’s dramatic, messy, yet addictive, and all it takes is just 60 seconds.

You’re hooked. Before you realise it, you’re four episodes deep into a vertical soap opera you didn’t even plan to watch. Welcome to the world of microdramas – bite-sized serialised storytelling that merges the emotional pull of daily soaps with the pace of Instagram Reels.

“The trick is the cliffhanger,” said Anshuman Misraa, who cofounded microdrama streaming app Reelies. “You end each episode in a way that the viewer has to see what happens next.”

What played behind the shift? It’s the shrinking attention span. The attention span for humans has reduced from 12 seconds in 2000 to 8 seconds in 2025, falling shorter than that of a goldfish by 1 second. But, we can’t thrive with the goldfish memory.

What caused this sharp loss in attention? It’s the unabated and unbridled influx of digital information. And, what happened next? Short-form content emerged and conquered our mind space. Bite-sized, instant-gratification content, such as microdramas, seemed particularly appealing through this shrinking engagement window.

Enter, Soap Opera 2.0: Entertainment Reaches Its Vertical Era

Think of microdramas as an evolved version of soap operas meant for the fast-paced generations, not designed for televisions but for phone screens.

When we talk about phone screens, in the world of Reels, it’s more about the short time and attention span of the user that they are fighting for, rather than star cast, expensive production setups, and the excitement.

Although late to the microdrama party, India too sees a disruption in the entertainment space. Gone are the days of 1,833 episodes of Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi running for over eight years. Entertainment startups are breaking down 30-40-minute, long-format stories into 60-120-second vertical videos or microdramas.

“Microdramas are soap operas 2.0 but designed natively for mobiles. We strongly believe that microdramas are going to be the next phase of evolution for the entertainment industry and will redefine our entertainment ecosystem,” a spokesperson for Kuku TV said. Audio OTT startup Kuku FM rolled out the Kuku TV app for microdrama-related content earlier this year.

Indian startups like Reelies, Kuku and ReelSaga are swarming on this exponentially growing market with their pool of microdramas that are short, crisp, engaging, and easy-to-digest – perfect for an upwardly mobile working class, dominated by a younger, tech-savvy section of consumers.

The global market (excluding China) for microdramas, or ultra-short fiction content made for consumption on-the-go, was worth $2 Bn a year and might double by the end of 2025.

And India makes up a major chunk of this market, not just by virtue of its large smartphone-clad population or internet user base, but also for being one of the fastest-growing and largest OTT markets globally, pegged at $4.5 Bn with projections to reach $27.2 Bn by 2033.........

© Inc42