AI film's money map: tools and ads lead, and China's first AI feature in cinemas grossed about $250,000

Sanxingdui: Future Past, the first fully AI-made feature cleared for Chinese cinemas, grossed about RMB 1.7 million (about $250,000) by early November, according to Maoyan data cited by Chinese trades. Its producer, Bona Film Group, says it cost more than RMB 10 million. Higgsfield, which sells AI video tools, says it passed a $1 billion annualized run rate in September.

Those figures measure different things, and only one of them is audiences paying for an AI film. A run rate is a recent month of sales multiplied out to a year, a funding round is investors' money, and a box office gross is tickets. Set side by side, the money in AI film today comes from brands paying for ads and makers paying for tools, and paying viewers are the smallest line on the map. The part the coverage missed: the two answers that led our reader poll on X are largely the same money. Higgsfield says direct-to-consumer advertisers are a major source of its demand, so "selling the tools" and "ads and brand work" both describe brand budgets moving through software.

Tools: a real billion, built on ad work

Higgsfield's own explainer is unusually clear about what its number is. The run rate is "revenue from the latest four weeks multiplied by 13", and the FAQ asks whether the company earned $1 billion in the past year and answers no. It reports nearly a million paying subscribers, says subscriptions fell from more than 90% of revenue to just over 60% as pay-per-use work grew, and says contracted revenue from business customers rose tenfold since June. CEO Alex Mashrabov says the company has been breaking even on a cash-flow basis over the past couple of months.

The same post names the engine: "Direct-to-consumer businesses are a major source of demand because advertising production is iterative." Reports citing Bloomberg put about 70% of Higgsfield's revenue with agencies and business clients; we have not seen Bloomberg's figures directly. Runway reported $200 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR, a yearly projection of subscription income) for September, and co-CEO Anastasis Germanidis told Bloomberg Tech in London on Tuesday 3 November he expects $450 million by year end, a forecast rather than a result. No tool company says how much of its revenue comes from film or series work. When Higgsfield makes films, such as Hell Grind, which it showed at the Marché du Film in May, they work as showcases for the product.

Ads: where the brand budget lands

The paying customer for AI advertising is the brand. It pays a tool directly when its own team generates the work, or it pays an agency that then pays the tool. One agency, Admiral Media, publishes AI creative retainers from about EUR 4,000 to EUR 21,500 a month. PJ Accetturo, whose studio Genre.ai makes AI commercials, said on Wrapbook's podcast in September: "We rarely charge over a hundred thousand dollars, but we can charge a hundred thousand dollars or more for some AI ads." What nobody has is a reliable total. The $57 billion figure that circulates as "AI-powered ad spend" is money spent buying media through automated platforms, which is a different budget from paying for the ads themselves.

Microdramas: a big pot with no AI line

Short-drama apps outside China took about $1.04 billion from in-app purchases in the first half of 2026, roughly flat on a year earlier, according to an industry white paper reported by 36Kr. That total includes live action. A sample from the Xiaguang Think Tank suggests AI dramas make up about 95% of Chinese short dramas sent overseas but draw only about 4% of the views, and the researchers say their sample is not the whole market. The useful fact for this story is older. Bona's 2024 AI microdrama set in the same Sanxingdui world drew about 200 million views online. Those views did not turn into ticket sales for the feature.

Features: what the tickets actually paid

Sanxingdui: Future Past opened on Friday 23 October with more than 8,000 screenings booked over its first four days. By Monday 26 October it had taken RMB 1.229 million, averaging 0.3 viewers per screening, and by Monday 2 November it stood at RMB 1.678 million from about 57,000 admissions, according to Maoyan data cited by Caijing and the 21st Century Business Herald. Producer Jiang Defu told Geek Movie the film took a team of 70 to 80 people more than two years, with total investment above RMB 10 million. A Guardian review said the film cost "tens of millions"; every Chinese source we read says the ten-million level, which points to a translation slip.

Cinemas and levies take most of a Chinese gross, so the producer keeps far less. Caijing estimated Bona's share at about RMB 800,000, under a tenth of the cost, and a Sina analysis put it nearer RMB 430,000. Both are estimates. Bona's half-year report gives the wider picture: its AI film and drama unit earned RMB 1.93 million in revenue at a 96.8% gross margin, which was 0.42% of group revenue in a half when the group lost RMB 169 million. Bona calls the business early stage, with its business model still to be proven, and it is pressing on: a second AI feature, Unplanned: Operation Guanghan, is in production. Its shares fell by the daily limit on Monday 26 October, the first trading day after opening weekend.

France's Inevitable is the other feature number in circulation, and it is a funding round. The studio announced EUR 15 million from unnamed private investors, with no valuation disclosed. The widely repeated "$250,000 per feature" is a starting price for clients, quoted as from EUR 250,000 on its French site and from $300,000 on its English one. Our own poll post last week repeated the $250,000 figure as if it were a cost per film. It is a quote, and no Inevitable feature has been released yet.

What the poll does and does not show

By Monday, 97 people had voted in our X poll on where the real money in AI film is: selling the tools 35%, ads and brand work 26%, microdramas 25%, making features 14%. The poll stays open until Tuesday 10 November, and we promoted it with paid posts, which delivered most of its impressions. There was no option for none of the above, and the most-liked reply said there is no money in AI films at all. Read fairly, the votes say features came last and that tools and ads, once you see they overlap, hold a clear majority.

What it means for AI creators

• The biggest pot today is brand work. Creators who can deliver many tested ad variants are selling into the same budget that funds the tool companies.
• A feature still has to find people who will pay, and China's first test found few. The next one is Gods Don't Give Gifts, which opens in US theaters on Friday 4 December.
• Each headline number answers a different question. A run rate, an ARR forecast, a raise and a box office gross should never be compared as if they were the same thing.

Our take

Brand budgets are not a lesser kind of money: they pay working creators and fund the tools everyone uses. But until an AI feature sells tickets in numbers, "AI film revenue" mostly means ads made with film tools.

Timeline

• Date: Mon 8 Jul 2024. Event: Bona's AI microdrama in the Sanxingdui world launches on Douyin; later about 200M views; Source: Bona; Cartoon Brew
• Date: Wed 26 Aug 2026. Event: Bona half-year report: AI unit RMB 1.93M revenue, 0.42% of group; Source: Restated by NBD, Caijing
• Date: Thu 24 Sep 2026. Event: Bloomberg reports Higgsfield passes a $1B run rate; Source: Reports citing Bloomberg
• Date: Tue 29 Sep 2026. Event: Higgsfield explains its run rate as four weeks of revenue times 13; Source: Higgsfield blog
• Date: Fri 23 Oct 2026. Event: Sanxingdui: Future Past opens in China; Higgsfield announces a Series B extension; Source: Maoyan via Caijing; Variety
• Date: Mon 26 Oct 2026. Event: Sanxingdui at RMB 1.229M; Bona shares fall by the daily limit; Source: Caijing; CLS
• Date: Mon 26 Oct 2026. Event: Trades report Inevitable's EUR 15M raise; Source: Advanced Television
• Date: Mon 2 Nov 2026. Event: Sanxingdui at RMB 1.678M from about 57,000 admissions; Source: Maoyan via 21st Century Business Herald
• Date: Tue 3 Nov 2026. Event: Runway co-CEO forecasts $450M ARR by year end; Source: Bloomberg Tech remarks, as reported
• Date: Wed 4 Nov 2026. Event: Our reader poll on AI film money opens on X; Source: X
• Date: Tue 10 Nov 2026. Event: Poll closes; Source: X
• Date: Fri 4 Dec 2026. Event: Gods Don't Give Gifts opens in US theaters (limited); Source: Variety; The Numbers

Sources and what is unconfirmed: Higgsfield blog posts of 29 Sep and 23 Oct 2026; Variety, 22 and 23 Oct; Runway remarks at Bloomberg Tech London, 3 Nov, as reported; Wrapbook On Production podcast, 8 Sep; 36Kr, 27 Oct and 3 Nov; Caijing, 30 Oct; CLS, 27 Oct; 21st Century Business Herald, 3 Nov; Geek Movie interview via Tencent News, 23 Oct; Bona half-year results as restated by NBD and Caijing; Cartoon Brew, 26 Oct and 2 Nov; The Guardian, 3 Nov; Advanced Television, 26 Oct; poll results read on 9 Nov. Unconfirmed: the 70% business share of Higgsfield revenue (we did not read Bloomberg), Runway's year-end figure (a forecast), any AI-only microdrama revenue, and the Sanxingdui total after 4 Nov (later reports conflict, and the figures here are the ones that fit daily grosses). Dollar conversions follow the rates used in the original reports. We did not contact Bona, Higgsfield, Runway or Inevitable.

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