Kidari Studio is having a banner year with their Q2 numbers hitting far above the black and providing a model by which webtoon publishers and platforms can actually be profitable. At least based on the numbers we’re looking at on their financial disclosures.
Let’s take a look.
Kidari by the Numbers
First, the big numbers:
Revenue: 64.42 billion KRW (22.1% increase YoY)
Operating Profit: 5.52 billion KRW (193.19% increase YoY)
A quick reminder, because I’m assuming most folks are going to compare Kidari Studio with Webtoon Entertainment’s Q2 financials which I posted about last week, while both companies are technically both webtoon companies the genres and audiences they work with are completely different.
Kidari Studio operates the Bomtoon and Lezhin suite of webtoons which means they are singularly focused on adult titles, specifically BL content in the international digital publishing market.
The big business move in Q1 was the launching of Lezhin Snack, the short-form content publishing platform that’s positioned to compete with ReelShorts and other pay-per-view short-form content platforms. Lezhin Snack launched in early February which makes Q2 the first full-quarter that the platform has been operational.
But to see whether the platform has made an impact, we have to dig a bit deeper.
Overseas and Domestic Revenue by Division
Kidari’s financial reports break this down further into their four divisions, but let’s stick to the content-side which are webtoon, webnovel, and video.
Let’s start with webtoons.
Webtoons
Webtoon revenue: 53.32 billion KRW
Webtoon operating profits: 4.73 billion KRW
Right off the bat, the webtoon division has been firmly in the black for the fourth consecutive quarter at Kidari Studio. It’s a healthy sign that the company has found a balance between operations and production.
Webtoon: 53.32 billion KRW (27.64% increase YoY)
Domestic (Korea): 45.29 billion KRW (49.32% increase YoY)
Overseas: 7.65 billion KRW (33.16% decrease YoY)
Right off the bat, the Korean webtoon operations side has seen a significant increase YoY showing that the female-adult webtoon market is string incredibly strong in Korea.
Worryingly, the overseas market has collapsed year-on-year with a 33.16% drop in revenue. The overseas market includes French, Thai, English, Spanish, Japanese and German so it’s going to be nearly impossible to know which languages are responsible for the drop.
That being said… 7.65 billion KRW is a concerningly low number. Especially compared to 2025 when the lowest quarterly revenue was 11.44 billion KRW in Q2. And when you compare it to Q1 2026 when the overseas revenue was 17.95 billion KRW… yeah.
Webnovel
I always think of skipping this one, but it’s worth mentioning as part of the industry cycle.
Webnovel revenue: 1.15 billion KRW
Domestic (Korea): 1.15 billion KRW (15.34% decrease YoY)
Webnovel operating profits: -268 million KRW
Webnovel revenue is a gimme as the it’s the lowest earning division which follows the pattern we’ve seen in the Korean market.
Video
Which brings us to the video division.
Video revenue: 1.18 billion KRW
Domestic (Korea): 732.72 million KRW (16.13% decrease YoY)
Overseas: 447.76 million KRW (11.11% increase YoY)
Video operating profits: -863.45 million KRW
In terms of numbers, the drop is quite extreme. We’re seeing a 55.82% decrease overall from Q1 while the Korean-side saw a 71.40% drop from Q1. While Kidari Studio does license IPs and directly participate in film production, Lezhin Snack is likely their biggest ongoing business projects.
And when viewed through that lens, the numbers for Lezhin Snack are unimpressive but the platform is less than a year old and in direct competition with the current ongoing short-form boom.
And considering the fact that Kidari is still actively producing new titles to launch on the platform, it makes sense they’d still be in the red.
Long story, short: webtoons are profitable and running the entire show.
Merch is Up… and Down
The big news of the day is merchandising which, in the webtoon industry, is the profit driver. When you consider production costs, platform operations, and marketing… somehow physical merch is more profitable which is something.
Merchandising revenue: 8.78 billion KRW
Domestic (Korea): 8.08 billion KRW (35.76% increase YoY)
Overseas: 698.56 million KRW (50.39% decrease YoY)
Merchandising operating profits: 1.91 billion KRW
Don’t let the last line get you down because it’s positive overall.
As Korea is the home of Kidari and Lezhin’s merch operations, shipping and fulfillment are going to take a significant amount of time.
That being said, the increase in revenue in Korea is heartening and it’s only a matter of time until overseas production and logistics catches up. Hopefully. I mean, they better.
But the profitability of the division and the increase in Korea’s revenue mean that the company has a strong baseline and understanding of what their fandom wants. Now, they just have to get it to them.
Looking Forward
The biggest moves on the horizon are actually content related which is possibly the best sign for the company. The biggest title in the history Lezhin Comics’ catalogue, Painter of the Night, recently launched a new set of special episodes back in July.
Yes, there have been some hiccups. The most public is the closure of Lezhin Comics Japan (in favor of BeLToon, a separate Japanese webtoon platform owned and operated by Kidari Studio), but that’s only a hiccup. Lezhin Snack has the potential to be either a genius expansion into a new medium or just another black hole of resources and funding.
Overall, the market sentiment is positive with Kidari Studio’s stock price rising significantly after the Q2 earnings report was released. Even after the screenshot below, Kidari’s stock rose to 6,180 KRW a share.
If this is what we’re seeing for Q2, I’m very curious to see what happens in Q3.