The Vertical Drama Bet of a Kyiv Studio

At first, Holywater was not a television business. It was in 2020 that Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov established the studio in Kyiv, Ukraine, and its portfolio to this day reads more like a mobile entertainment lab than a streaming network. Next to My Drama are My Passion for books, My Muse for AI and FreeBits. This mix matters, because it shows a company that views video as one of https://ai-fruit-love-island.com/series/the-dragon-king-s-return/ several consumer products rather than its entire identity. The vertical drama, a format that began in China as duanju and is framed 9:16 for an upright phone, was the bet it eventually made. The sector’s leading names were supported by Chinese and Singaporean groups, so moving into this market was a brave step for a small Ukrainian business.

The My Drama App Launches in Spring 2024

Spring 2024 saw the launch of the My Drama app, although the exact date depends on which record you trust. According to TechCrunch, the launch happened in April, while Google Play lists March 13, 2024, and the App Store shows May 9, 2024. Android appears to have come first, since the gap between those store dates indicates, with the iPhone version arriving about two months later. The opening slate was heavily built around the genre’s favorite tropes. Initial titles such as The Shy Beauty and the Billionaire Beast and Love Captive to a Mafia Boss reveal most of what you need to know about the mood just by their names. What in the end distinguished the company was not the stories themselves but the partner it would soon be producing them with.

The Fox Deal, a $22M Round and a Webby

The month My Drama stopped being a startup curiosity was October 2025. Fox Entertainment acquired an equity stake in Holywater, in a deal that included a commitment to produce more than 200 vertical titles over two years. In January 2026, three months on, Holywater pulled in $22M in a round led by Horizon Capital. Fox-produced titles on the app include Billionaire Blackmail, Bound by Obsession and My Heart’s Offside. The company also has a Webby Award for Best Streaming Service from 2025, a distinction it displays on its App Store listing. These milestones, taken together, give My Drama a rare advantage that few rivals can claim: a major American studio serving as both shareholder and producer.

My Drama: Key Facts

The quick version of the story is in the table below, for readers who only have a minute. The ownership, legal, platform and pricing details that matter most to a new viewer are collected in one place. All prices come from the US App Store as of September 2026. Country, platform and promotion all change them, so read them as a rough guide rather than a quote. The legal entity you deal with depends on where you live, which turns out to be relevant if you ever need to challenge a charge. The install figure is taken from Google Play, where the app lists 5M+ downloads.

Topic	Details
Parent company	Holywater, set up in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 2020
Co-founders	Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov
Related apps	My Passion for books, My Muse for AI, plus FreeBits
Contract party, US users	XOLY LIMITED (Delaware)
Contract party, other users	Holy Water Limited (Nicosia, Cyprus)
Launch date	Spring 2024 (Google Play on March 13; App Store on May 9)
Supported platforms	iPhone, iPad, Apple TV (tvOS 18+), Vision Pro, Android, web
Installs on Android	5M+ via Google Play
Full-access plan	Around $19.99 per week, with automatic renewal
Coin bundles	About $4.99 to $24.99
Premium tier	Roughly $4.99 to $9.99
Studio backer	Fox Entertainment, equity stake held since October 2025, 200+ titles over two years
Latest funding	$22M raised in January 2026, led by Horizon Capital
Recognition	Webby Award for Best Streaming Service, 2025

What It Feels Like to Watch My Drama

The basic experience mirrors the one the whole category is built on. Framed for an upright phone, episodes are vertical, and in this genre they typically run a minute or two before a cliffhanger nudges you on to the next. Series often run anywhere from 20 to 100 episodes, so a single story can quietly swallow an evening in short bites. Where this drama app really sets itself apart is the range of screens it supports. Besides iPhone, iPad and Android, it is listed for Apple TV on tvOS 18 or later and for Vision Pro. This big-screen option is rarer than you might expect: by comparison, ReelShort’s App Store listing shows no Apple TV version at all. The option transforms a solo phone habit into something a couple can enjoy together, even though a 9:16 frame will never fill a widescreen TV.

Content-wise, the catalog mixes Holywater’s own early productions with the growing Fox slate. As titles like Billionaire Blackmail and Bound by Obsession make obvious, the Fox releases stay close to the genre’s established formula. Scale is where the fair caveat comes in. With 5M+ installs on Google Play, the app has a small fraction of the 100M+ that ReelShort, DramaBox and ShortMax each list. That gap puts My Drama in 2026 as a well-funded challenger rather than the category leader.

What My Drama Costs in 2026: Pricing

Holywater sells access three ways, and the main figure is the weekly pass. As of September 2026, the US App Store prices « My Drama: Full Access » at roughly $19.99 per week. That places it on par with the weekly passes from ReelShort, ShortMax, DramaWave and GoodShort, which are listed at about the same price in the same store. For unlocking individual episodes, there are coin bundles priced from roughly $4.99 to $24.99. A separate Premium tier is listed at roughly $4.99 to $9.99, so lighter viewers have lower-cost entry points than the full pass. Prices change by country, platform and promotion, so the figure on your own device may be different. Like its rivals’ plans, the weekly subscription auto-renews until you cancel it. Before you commit, do the math: four renewals of a $19.99 weekly pass come to roughly $80 a month.

Before You Pay: The Terms to Know

The fine print in My Drama’s terms of use merits more attention than most viewers give it. As coin purchases are final, there is no easy refund if a series lets you down after you unlock it. A balance you ignore for a year can simply disappear, since coins are forfeited after 12 months of inactivity. For viewers in the EU and UK, there is a 14-day right of withdrawal, in line with the consumer rules in those markets. Purchases made on the web are listed as non-refundable except where the law requires otherwise. The key point is this: the terms say clearly that deleting the app does not cancel your subscription. Android users go through the Subscriptions menu in Google Play, while on an iPhone you cancel under Settings, then your name, then Subscriptions. Apple or Google, not Holywater, deal with refunds for store purchases.

Knowing exactly who sits on the other side of the contract is also useful. For US users, the contracting party is XOLY LIMITED, a Delaware company; everyone else contracts with Holy Water Limited in Nicosia, Cyprus. A further warning applies to My Drama as much as to any vertical drama app. Modded APKs, unlimited coins and free coin generators are promised by unofficial sites, and such sites are not a safe way to watch anything. The legitimate response to a steep price is to cancel the pass, not to go hunting for a hack.

Verdict: A Challenger With Hollywood in Its Corner

Measured by install counts, My Drama is not the biggest vertical drama app, and it is not close. A Kyiv founding story, a Fox equity partner signed up for more than 200 titles, fresh funding from January 2026 and a Webby on the shelf make up the uncommon combination it offers instead. The practical upside for viewers is Apple TV support, something ReelShort, for one, does not list. The downside is the same one that dogs every rival: a weekly pass of about $19.99 that renews quietly in the background. If the largest claimed library is simply what you want, ShortMax, with its 50,000+ dramas, is the more obvious choice. The My Drama app earns a place on your home screen if you want Fox-produced romance and the option to watch on a TV. Whatever you decide, do not trust the delete button: create a reminder the day you subscribe and cancel through your store account.