(Yicai Global) March 7 -- The number of Chinese TV dramas has started to decrease while most of last year's new releases have received discouraging ratings. 

The number of new series fell 20 percent annually to 194 in 2018, which is the lowest in a decade, according to data released by Chinese TV drama producers' annual meeting in Shanghai on March 5. Some 82 percent of all new programs got a 0.5 percent rating.

The slowdown proves that the success of Story of Yanxi Palace, a period drama series set in the Qing dynasty which has received over 10 billion replays, is not easy to replicate. 

The slump in output was an inevitable result of market transformation, specialists said, while blaming domestic TV dramas for overproduction. Major film companies have woken up to the need of focusing on fewer programs but with higher quality, the participants added. 

TV producers need to improve their product quality while facing a cooling market, said Zheng Weidong, a data scientist from CSM Media Research. The reduction in the number of releases shows that a bubble is gone, he added. 

Editor: Emmi Laine