Online novels, games, film&TV works ‘troika’ of Chinese culture going overseas

Online novels, games and film and television works have developed into the “troika” of Chinese culture going overseas, according to the 2023 Report on the Development of Chinese Online Literature released by the Institute of Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) on Monday.

Being promoted by three core trends, including intellectual property (IP) transformation and deepening globalization, Chinese online literature, a remarkable practice of mass participation and global cocreation, demonstrates the originality of Chinese culture and has become a platform for telling Chinese stories well and spreading China’s voices, according to Chen Dingjia, a researcher at the Institute of Literature, CASS.

Data in the report shows that as of the end of 2023, China’s online literature market reached 40.43 billion yuan ($5.62 billion), a year-on-year increase of 3.8 percent. The online literature IP market size jumped significantly to 260.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase by nearly 10 billion yuan.

The number of online literature authors in China reached 24.05 million, the number of online literature works reached 36.2 million, and the number of online literature users reached 537 million, a yearon-year increase of 9 percent, which means half of Chinese internet users read online literature.

The report points out that with the increase of influence of Chinese online literature, online novels, games and film and television works have developed into a means of taking Chinese culture overseas.

Statistics show that the market size of the overseas online literature market now exceeds 4 billion yuan, with about 410,000 overseas online writers, 620,000 overseas original works and 230 million overseas visiting users, covering more than 200 countries and regions around the world.

Besides this, new technologies like AI translation also contributed to Chinese online literature going overseas.