VOL.69/2024.04

 

Recent Status of Korean Webnovels

 

2024.04.01

 

 

 

The size and the current status of the market

 

The webnovel industry, which was officially recognized in 2013 with the NAVER Webnovel Contest, has nearly doubled every year since then - expanding to a market worth 1 trillion won by 2024. It has firmly established itself as one of the pillars of the Korean content market alongside webtoons. Media mixing is actively taking place through the content value chain centered on Kakao and Naver, and this potential has attracted many creators to take on the challenge of writing webnovels full of dreams.
According to the “2022 Status Survey of the Webnovel Industry” published by the Publication Industry Promotion Agency of Korea (KPIPA) in 2023, the number of webnovel users in Korea was estimated at 5.87 million, and the estimated revenue of the entire webnovel industry was worth 1.39 trillion won. This is an increase of more than 400 billion won from the 600 billion won estimated in 2021. Based on these numbers alone, the future of the webnovel industry seems very rosy. The market is growing, and the possibilities seem endless. However, when you look at the creators behind the scenes, the market is rather grim.
The survey also asked 500 webnovel writers with an average of more than 8 years of experience, at least 4 completed works, and 2 ongoing serialized works, about their creative environment, and discovered that they spend an average of 6 to 12 months on a single work, working an average of 4.3 days per week and an average of 5.5 hours per day. Their total annual income averaged 34.87 million won in 2021, of which less than half (46.1%) came from webnovel serialization, and most said they earned their living from other sources unrelated to webnovels. In particular, the proportion of income from secondary works was insignificant at 1.1%.

 

 

Regarding the average price per work, 27.8% of the works were paid between 100,000 won and less than 1 million won, followed by 19.8% of works paid between 1 million won and 3 million won. The average amount per webnovel was less than 5 million won in 72.6% of cases, which is quite low considering the length of time it takes to complete a webnovel and the cost of creative writing activities. Only 4.0% of webnovels were paid more than 50 million won per work, indicating that the distribution of the average payment per webnovel is highly skewed toward the lower end. In addition, 34.4% of the writers reported that they had experienced unfair contracts in which they were forced to sign biased agreements in favor of the platform or CP (production company), regarding secondary copyrights and overseas publishing rights, and 30% of the writers reported that they received insufficient or no information on sales or settlement details, and experienced delays or restraints in revenue distribution.
In the end, the data shows that while the webnovel market is growing, it is only a few media-mixed works, such as webtoons and dramas, that are driving huge profits, and more than half of the writers are not even able to make a living from webnovel writing alone.

 

Shadow of the market

 

In fact, there are many voices within the webnovel industry calling out the difficulties in the market that are unrelated to the expansion of the market size. A common statement within CPs is that “the overall volume of revenue from the webnovel market has declined.” Currently, the overall profit size of webnovels launched is decreasing regardless of platform and genre. There are a number of webnovel publishers that are downsizing, reducing their workforce, or going bankrupt. There are two common issues that the industry complains about: 1) poor effects of promotion, and 2) no difference in the size of revenue between new and mid-career writers.
There are several reasons for this phenomenon - the first is that face-to-face work has become normalized again after COVID-19, when working from home used to be common. If we look at the “2020 Webnovel User Survey” published by the Korea Creative Content Agency in 2020 and the previous survey reports together, several indicators can be found.

 

 

Compared to 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic began, the number of readers paying less than 50,000 won for webnovels has dropped. However, the number of readers that say they have never paid for a webnovel has increased. The fact that more people read webnovels outside, such as on public transportation, at work, or in cafes, might suggest that webnovel consumption is taking place in a variety of places, but it also suggests that the proportion of face-to-face work that involves meeting and interacting with people outside of the home work environment has increased, leaving less time to read webnovels.
Considering the increase in Google’s in-app payment charges, the decrease in payment amount comes as a shock to individual webnovel writers. Moreover, the increasingly competitive paid promotion policies of platforms indicate that it will be even more difficult to generate paid readership given the finite amount of time that webnovel readers spend on a specific platform and retain traffic.

 

Prospect of the market

 

Still, the growing size of the webnovel industry implies that webnovels are expanding in popularity, not only among existing webnovel readers but also among general readers.
Dramas based on webnovel IPs, such as Reborn Rich (Teraphosa) and Marry My Husband (A Tempo Media), have performed well, and webtoons based on webnovel IPs are also doing well in the Korean and global markets. The so-called successful writers are earning more than 10 billion won, raising the ceiling of expected revenue for works in the market, and as there are more ways to utilize webnovel IP in other forms other than video media, such as metaverse idols and games, it is worth looking forward to this prospect.

 

* K-Book Trends Vol. 57 – Go to the article about Reborn Rich

 

Also, it is expected that technological advancements such as the development of AI and augmented reality devices may change the system of one-person creation centered on smartphones. In particular, it will be interesting to see how the webnovel market, which has been characterized by its narrative based on the size of a smartphone’s screen, will change when devices centered on metaverses, such as Vision Pro are gradually invented.
The number of universities related to webnovels is increasing, and there are more publishers providing special lectures, courses in general humanities, or private academies. In the industry, rather than a direct contract between a writer and a CP, there is an increasing number of intermediary contracts in which the management at the academy or studio level represents the writer or runs a writers’ organization and proposes a contract to the CP. It remains to be seen whether these creative organizations will lead to collective action by webnovel writers in the future, or whether they will change the shape of the industry.
Genre literature, the predecessor of webnovels, has been experiencing ups and downs since the days of martial arts novels. At the core of this rise and fall is the reliance of genre literature IP on a narrow distribution network and market. However, the webnovel market, which has expanded infinitely across platforms and media, is unlikely to collapse even in a temporary recession. Now is the time to pay attention to market conditions and technological advancements, and plan strategies for the next webnovel market. If you are interested in the webnovel market, you will have to follow the movement of the webnovel market more carefully.

 

References
2022 Status Survey of the Webnovel Industry, Publication Industry Promotion Agency of Korea (KPIPA), 2023
2020 Webnovel User Survey, Korea Creative Content Agency, 2020

 

 

---

Written by Lee Yung-Hee (Cultural researcher)