News Reporter | Song Jianan
Just over a month after announcing it would cease operations, ByteDance’s paid reading app Hongzhu Story officially shut down its servers on August 17, leaving users unable to log in or use the application.
That same day, a quick search for “Hongzhu Story” on the Apple App Store turned up nothing. Some users, however, reported on social media that the app was still searchable and downloadable via the Xiaomi App Store—but as soon as you open it, a “Service Suspension Notice” pops up immediately.
The notice reveals that on July 9, the platform first closed all paid entry points. Membership renewals, book coin purchases, chapter purchases, and full-book purchases were all halted. For users who had enabled auto-renewal, the system automatically terminated deductions—no manual cancellation needed.
By July 10, Hongzhu Story stopped updating any novel content entirely, closing all content consumption scenarios. Simultaneously, the platform initiated refunds for users’ remaining balances. This carried on until August 17, when the servers were completely shut down.
When asked about what’s next after Hongzhu Story’s closure, we reached out to ByteDance for further comment but received no response as of press time.
Hongzhu Story was formerly known as Hongzhu Novel, officially launching in December 2025. It was operated by Jiangxi Bihui Moying Technology Co., Ltd., with a registered capital of 1 million RMB and legal representative Le Li. The company is 100% indirectly held by Beijing Bimo Liuxiang Technology Co., Ltd. Founded in July 2021 with the same registered capital of 1 million RMB, Bimo Liuxiang is a Douyin Group subsidiary, fully owned by Beijing Douyin Information Service Co., Ltd.
From day one, this product was designed to complement Fanqie Novel, not compete head-on. Fanqie Novel operates on a free, ad-supported reading model, while Hongzhu Story targeted the premium paid-reading segment. It adopted a subscription model combined with per-book and per-chapter payments, aiming to attract hardcore readers willing to shell out money for web fiction.
The Hongzhu app’s homepage originally carried over Fanqie’s minimalist design, splitting into three main sections: “Recommended,” “Novels,” and “Short Stories.” It also featured membership and free zones—though the free zone only offered a handful of complimentary titles, with everything else requiring payment. Before the shutdown, Hongzhu’s monthly membership cost 25 RMB, which included ad-free access to premium member content and a 20% discount on paid books.
What’s worth noting is that ByteDance rarely mentioned Hongzhu Story publicly. It was always an internal, low-key experimental project—not a core initiative. Marketing efforts were minimal, and general user awareness remained quite low.
After launch, Hongzhu Story simply didn’t deliver the market performance that was hoped for. Download numbers across app stores were underwhelming, making it tough to compete against established players like China Literature, Zhangyue, or even ByteDance’s own Fanqie Novel. The platform also failed to produce its own exclusive hit titles, with much of its content heavily overlapping with ByteDance’s existing web fiction pool.
Zooming out to China’s broader online reading market, the competitive landscape is already highly entrenched. According to the Q1 2026 mobile user report from CTR’s Xinghan Mobile User Analytics System, the free web fiction model dominates the market. Fanqie Novel and Qimao Free Novel sit firmly in the top traffic tier, with Fanqie boasting 453 million users. Meanwhile, the paid fiction segment has long been controlled by veterans like China Literature and Zhangyue, who hold massive libraries of author talent and IP reserves built up over years—making it incredibly difficult for newcomers to break in.
Even though the free model pulls in huge user numbers, converting that free traffic into paying readers is a natural bottleneck. Market estimates suggest free reading platforms typically see a paid conversion rate of around 12%—far below traditional paid reading platforms. The cost of acquiring paying users for new paid products remains painfully high.
Truth be told, this isn’t ByteDance’s first stumble in the paid fiction space. Before Hongzhu Story, several other ByteDance-affiliated paid fiction products—including Douwen Novel, Jiudu Novel, and Bingke Novel—had all already shut down one by one.
Some analysts argue that ByteDance’s real strength lies in free traffic operations. Paid fiction, on the other hand, demands long-term cultivation of authors, IP, and paying user loyalty—a moat that can’t be breached just by throwing money at it short-term. When a product fails to hit business expectations, cutting losses and pulling back is the standard playbook for internet companies.
Beyond external market competition, ByteDance has also been shifting internal resources toward faster-growing businesses like short dramas and AI content in recent years. Standalone paid fiction apps are simply no longer a strategic priority.
With Hongzhu Story now out of the picture, ByteDance’s focus in the web fiction arena will almost certainly center on Fanqie Novel. As the core engine of ByteDance’s fiction division, Fanqie continues its free ad-supported reading model while doubling down on IP incubation and short drama adaptations—shouldering the bulk of revenue and user growth targets for the segment.
According to QuestMobile data, as of February this year, Fanqie Free Novel boasted approximately 260 million monthly active users, up 1.3% year-over-year. Fanqie currently has over 600,000 signed authors, more than 780,000 signed works, and a copyright library exceeding 1.5 million titles—forming a massive and diverse content creation ecosystem.
Hongzhu Story’s brief eight-month run was, in many ways, both a business experiment for ByteDance and a mirror reflecting the seemingly unbridgeable gap between free and paid models in the web fiction industry. For anyone trying to play in this space, simply cloning a membership system isn’t nearly enough. The real lifeline for any paid reading product lies in delivering genuinely differentiated, exclusive content that readers can’t find anywhere else.
