The Vertical Drama Gamble of a Kyiv Studio
In the beginning, Holywater was not a television business. The company was launched in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 2020 by Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov, and its lineup to this day looks more like a lab for mobile entertainment than a streaming network. My Drama sits in a portfolio with My Passion for books, My Muse reel short drama for AI and FreeBits. This breadth is telling, since video is one consumer product among several for the company, not its whole identity. In the end, it made its wager on the vertical drama, a format that began in China as duanju and is framed 9:16 for a phone held upright. The groups behind the category’s biggest names were Chinese and Singaporean, making this a daring market for a small Ukrainian company to enter.
The My Drama App Arrives in Spring 2024
In spring 2024, the My Drama app debuted, although the exact date varies with which source you believe. TechCrunch put the launch in April, Google Play gives March 13, 2024, and the App Store shows May 9, 2024. Those store dates indicate that Android was first, with the iPhone version following about two months later. The opening slate was heavily built around the genre’s favorite tropes. Most of what you need to know about the mood is clear in initial titles such as The Shy Beauty and the Billionaire Beast and Love Captive to a Mafia Boss. It was not the stories themselves that eventually made the studio stand out, but the partner it would soon be producing them with.
A Fox Deal, a $22M Raise and a Webby
During October 2025, My Drama ceased to be just a startup curiosity. Fox Entertainment acquired an equity stake in Holywater, and the agreement came with a commitment to make more than 200 vertical titles over two years. Included in the Fox-produced titles on the service are Billionaire Blackmail, Bound by Obsession and My Heart’s Offside. A $22M funding round led by Horizon Capital came three months later, in January 2026, when Holywater raised the money. The company also holds a Webby Award for Best Streaming Service from 2025, a distinction it shows off on its App Store listing. Few rivals can boast what these milestones give My Drama, namely a big American studio acting as both shareholder and producer.
My Drama: Key Facts
If you only have a spare minute, the table below gives you the short version of the story. It collects in one place the details on ownership, legal matters, platforms and pricing that matter most to newcomers. As of September 2026, the prices match the ones shown in the US App Store. Because they vary by country, platform and promotion, read them as a guide rather than a firm quote. On Google Play, where the install figure comes from, the app shows 5M+ downloads. Which legal entity you contract with depends on where you live, a detail that becomes relevant if you ever need to challenge a charge.
| Category | Information |
|---|---|
| Owned by | Holywater, set up in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 2020 |
| Founded by | Bogdan Nesvit and Anatolii Kasianov |
| Related apps | My Passion (books), My Muse (AI), FreeBits |
| Contract party, US users | XOLY LIMITED (Delaware) |
| Contracting entity, 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, Android, Apple TV (tvOS 18+), Vision Pro and web |
| Android downloads | 5M+ on Google Play |
| Full access pass | Around $19.99 per week, renewing automatically |
| Coin bundles | Around $4.99 to $24.99 |
| Premium options | Around $4.99 to $9.99 |
| Production partner | Fox Entertainment, equity stake since October 2025, 200+ titles over two years |
| Funding | $22M in January 2026, led by Horizon Capital |
| Awards | Webby Award for Best Streaming Service, 2025 |
What It Feels Like to Watch My Drama
The basic experience is the one the entire category is built on. In this genre, episodes typically run a minute or two before a cliffhanger pushes you on to the next one, and they are vertical, sized for a phone held upright. Series often run anywhere from 20 to 100 episodes, so a single story can silently eat up an evening in short bites. The range of screens it supports is where this drama app really stands out. On top of iPhone, iPad and Android, it is listed for Apple TV on tvOS 18 or later and for Vision Pro. For comparison, ReelShort’s App Store listing shows no Apple TV version at all, so this big-screen option is less common than you might expect. The option transforms a solo phone habit into something a couple can watch together, even though a 9:16 frame will never fill a widescreen TV.
Holywater’s own early productions and the growing Fox slate make up the library, which blends the two. The genre’s familiar formula is still the template for the Fox releases, as titles like Billionaire Blackmail and Bound by Obsession make clear. Scale is the candid caveat here. At 5M+ installs on Google Play, the app has a small fraction of the 100M+ that ReelShort, DramaBox and ShortMax each show. That gap reveals where My Drama stands in 2026, as a well-backed challenger rather than the category leader.
Pricing: How Much My Drama Costs in 2026
Holywater sells access in three ways, and the headline figure is the weekly pass. “My Drama: Full Access” runs about $19.99 a week in the US App Store as of September 2026. That puts it in line with the weekly passes from ReelShort, ShortMax, DramaWave and GoodShort, all listed at about the same price in the same store. Coin packs, which unlock individual episodes, range from roughly $4.99 to $24.99. A separate Premium tier is listed at roughly $4.99 to $9.99, so lighter viewers have cheaper entry points than the full pass. Country, platform and promotion all change prices, so the figure on your own device may differ. As with its rivals’ plans, the weekly subscription renews automatically until you cancel it. Do the math before you commit, because four renewals of a $19.99 weekly pass come to roughly $80 a month.
Before You Pay: Terms Worth Knowing
The terms of use for My Drama contain fine print worth more attention than most viewers give it. As coin purchases are final, there is no easy refund if a series disappoints after you unlock it. After 12 months of inactivity, coins are also forfeited, so a balance left untouched for a year can simply vanish. Viewers in the EU and UK get a 14-day right of withdrawal, reflecting the consumer rules in those markets. Except where the law requires otherwise, purchases made on the web are labeled non-refundable. Crucially, the terms state plainly that deleting the app does not cancel your subscription. iPhone owners cancel under Settings, then their name, then Subscriptions, whereas Android users go through the Subscriptions menu in Google Play. 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. XOLY LIMITED, a Delaware company, handles US users, while everyone else contracts with Holy Water Limited in Nicosia, Cyprus. Here, as with any vertical drama app, a further warning applies. Modded APKs, unlimited coins and free coin generators are promised by unofficial sites, and such sites are not a safe way to watch anything. When the price seems steep, the legal move is to cancel the pass, not to go hunting for a hack.
Our Verdict: A Challenger With Hollywood in Its Corner
Measured by install counts, My Drama is not the largest vertical drama app, and it is not close. Rather, it offers an uncommon combination: a Kyiv founding story, a Fox equity partner committed to more than 200 titles, fresh funding from January 2026 and a Webby on the shelf. For viewers, the practical upside is Apple TV support, which ReelShort, for one, does not list. A weekly pass of around $19.99 that renews quietly in the background is the downside, the same one that plagues every rival. When the largest claimed library is all you want, ShortMax, with its 50,000+ dramas, is the more obvious pick. If you are after Fox-produced romance and the option to watch on a television, the My Drama app earns a place on your home screen. Whichever you choose, set a reminder on the day you subscribe and cancel through your store account instead of trusting the delete button.