China's microdrama rules: NRTA Order No. 16 and the filing regime

What is NRTA Order No. 16?

China's National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA) regulates microdrama through Order No. 16, the Measures for the Administration of Micro Short Drama Development (微短剧发展管理办法). The order took effect on 1 September 2026 and runs to 54 articles across eight chapters. It moves the format from notice-based supervision to a three-tier licensing regime (Order No. 16 tracker).

Article 2 defines a micro short drama as running under 20 minutes per episode and sets the scope as production and public broadcast within China. Internet television, IPTV and cable television are named as distribution channels within that scope.

The NRTA published a 53-article consultation draft on 24 June 2026, and comments closed on 23 July. The measures were approved at an NRTA executive meeting on 27 July, signed by the administration's head, Cao Shumin, on 30 July and published on 31 July. The order took effect unamended from that text and contains no transitional provision (Order No. 16 commencement).

What the three licence classes require

Article 5 sorts titles into three classes by investment and subject matter. Class 1 covers titles with large investment or special subject matter, such as politics, the military, diplomacy, national security, united front work, ethnicity, religion, the judiciary and public security. Without a licence, an approval document or a programme number, a title may not be broadcast or entered for awards.

Article 20 gives the authorities 20 days to decide on a Class 1 approval, including a 10-day expert panel. Article 27 requires opening titles to carry the title, licence number, approval document number and programme number. Article 50 allows a title to opt into a higher classification, and Article 53 preserves higher law.

Order No. 16 licence classes

AI labels, algorithms, paid content and export

Three clauses bear on how the format is made and sold. Article 34 requires micro short dramas generated or produced using AI to carry a prompt label in a prominent position in every episode. Article 37 requires platforms to audit algorithm mechanisms, models, data and outputs periodically, and forbids algorithm models that induce addiction or excessive consumption. Article 40 requires charging information to be clearly disclosed where paid content is offered. All three carry the same numbers as in the June draft.

Article 52, which does not appear in the draft, subjects micro short dramas shot in China for overseas broadcast to the filing and licensing provisions (Article 52). Article 8 states support for microdrama export. Chinese-origin apps took $1.182bn of about $1.27bn in overseas in-app purchase revenue in the first half of 2026, or 93%, on DataEye's figures (estimate).

The per-episode AI label is a Chinese requirement, not a European one. It is stricter than Article 50(4) of the EU AI Act, which reaches only deep fakes and, inside fiction, only in limited form (EU AI Act Article 50; see AI in microdramas).

Filing tiers, AI tiers and licence classes

Several tier systems circulate in coverage of the Chinese market, and only one of them is the licence regime (filing and AI tiers tracker).

The filing review tiers sort titles into key, ordinary and other by production budget and have applied since 1 January 2026. The thresholds reported for that system, which no official text has confirmed, are ¥3m and above for key titles and ¥1m to ¥3m for ordinary titles. A management notice from the NRTA's online audiovisual programme department, reported by Xinhua on 25 June 2026 and effective 1 July 2026, sets lower thresholds for AI micro short dramas. The notice describes itself as implementing existing tiered-management requirements, so it calibrates the filing tiers rather than running alongside them.

The licence classes of Order No. 16 had no published thresholds when the order took effect. Article 5 delegates the classification standard to the broadcasting authority under the State Council, and no monetary figure appears in the 54 articles. On 18 August 2026 Chinese trade outlets reported a management advisory dated 17 August that set live-action thresholds at RMB 3m and RMB 1m and AI thresholds at RMB 800,000 and RMB 300,000. As of 21 August 2026 it had not appeared on any government domain or in state media, so those figures are reported, not confirmed. Global Times described an earlier tiered review notice, issued in February 2025 and effective 1 June 2025, with thresholds of RMB 1m and RMB 300k.

Tier systems in Chinese microdrama regulation

Minors, AI services and enforcement

A draft at a higher legal tier followed. On 18 September 2026 the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) published draft State Council Provisions on Safeguarding Minors' Healthy and Safe Use of the Internet, for public comment until 17 October 2026 (minors provisions tracker). As an administrative regulation it would rank above Order No. 16. The draft never names micro short drama, but Article 5 requires online audio-video services to be delivered to users under 16 through a minor mode, and Article 8 prohibits algorithm models that induce emotional dependence, addiction or excessive consumption among minor users. Article 18 provides for fines of one to ten times illegal gains where those gains reach 1m yuan, and of 100,000 to 1m yuan otherwise. Article 25 leaves the commencement date blank.

Generative AI rules apply alongside. The CAC put cumulative totals to 31 August 2026 at 1,112 generative AI services filed and 731 applications registered, and restated that an app using a filed service has to display the model name and its filing number (CAC filings). At a symposium convened by the NRTA on 2 September, participants including 17 platforms and producers agreed that any use of fused likeness or voice requires the rightholder's express authorisation (likeness and voice).

On enforcement, Wang Xiaoliang, director-general of the NRTA's network audiovisual programme management department, said on 17 September 2026 that 68,000 non-compliant microdramas had been removed in 2026 and that platforms had been directed to act against more than 1,200 accounts, of which over 90% concerned AI dramas (NRTA briefing).

State support and timeline

The state also funds the format. The NRTA's premium microdrama programme collects projects in three tranches: the first notice, of 28 July 2026, listed 16 proposed projects and the second, of 4 September, listed 12. A readout of 1 September said seventeen provincial-level broadcasting authorities had committed fiscal funding (provincial funding). The regulator's 15th Five-Year Plan sets 500 excellent micro short dramas as a cumulative 2030 indicator and AI penetration of at least 95% for the sector (five-year plan).

Key dates for China's microdrama rules

Open questions

• What are the licence-class thresholds? Article 5 delegates them, and none had been issued as of 1 September 2026.
• Will implementing guidance, provincial rules or the filing-disclosure form required by Article 14 be published? None had appeared on the commencement date.
• How will Article 52 apply to co-productions and to work commissioned in China for foreign platforms?
• Will the AI classification notice be absorbed or superseded under the licence regime?
• When, and in what form, would the draft minors provisions take effect? Their commencement date is blank.