Alibaba's HappyHorse Launches: What Does Cinema-Level Video Mean for Regular People?

Alibaba has finally released HappyHorse to the public.

On April 27, Alibaba’s ATH Innovation Division officially opened HappyHorse 1.0 for beta testing. Professional creators can register on the official website and Alibaba Cloud Bailian platform, while regular users can experience it directly through the Qianwen App.

As a model that topped the Artificial Analysis global video rankings, what can it actually bring to regular people? This article helps you quickly understand.

First Things First: What Can HappyHorse Do?

Simply put, it’s an AI tool that helps you generate videos from text or images.

Its core features are divided into two main areas:

Video Generation

• Text-to-Video: Enter a text description, generate the corresponding video
• Image-to-Video: Upload an image, make it come alive
• Multi-Image Reference: Use multiple images as references to maintain character or scene consistency

Video Editing

• Make secondary creations and adjustments to already generated videos

Supported video length ranges from 3 to 15 seconds, with resolution up to 1080P.

For Regular People, What Can It Be Used For?

Seeing words like “Global #1” and “Cinema-Level” might make some people feel this is far beyond their reach. But in reality, if you have any of the following needs, HappyHorse is worth trying:

Short Video Creation: Want to make a visually appealing short video but don’t want to film it yourself? Just input a text description and the model generates the footage for you.

Static Images to Life: Have a good image and want to add some dynamic appeal to catch attention? The image-to-video feature can help you achieve this.

Quick Creative Verification: Have a visual concept in your head you want to see materialized? Running it through AI first costs much less than actual filming.

Social Media Content: Need something different for WeChat Moments, Weibo, or Xiaohongshu? The 15-second multi-shot narrative feature is perfect for this.

According to beta tester feedback, HappyHorse performed well on narrative content like Hong Kong-style shorts, old movie styles, and Three Kingdoms-themed content, with one-click templates available.

How About Pricing?

This is what everyone’s most concerned about. HappyHorse’s official website currently uses a tiered membership system:

Membership Tier	Key Benefits	720P Price	1080P Price
Free	Daily credits, 2 concurrent tasks	0.9 CNY/sec	Unavailable
Standard	Batch generation, no watermark	~0.44 CNY/sec	~0.78 CNY/sec
Professional	Full features, priority queue	~0.44 CNY/sec	~0.78 CNY/sec

Prices see significant discounts with membership. If you’re just a regular user wanting to try it out, the Qianwen App offers daily free credits. 5-second and 10-second videos can be generated for free; 15-second multi-shot requires payment.

Compared to Other Tools, What Are the Advantages?

From a technical standpoint, HappyHorse has several noteworthy features:

Native Audio-Video Sync: Not post-production dubbing or stitching, audio and video are generated together from the start by the model. Supports lip-sync in seven languages: Mandarin, Cantonese, English, Japanese, Korean, German, and French.

Generation Speed: Official data shows generating a 5-second 1080P video on a single H100 GPU takes about 38 seconds, which is relatively fast for a model at this resolution level.

Multi-Shot Narrative: Multiple shot transitions, camera movements, and transitions within 15 seconds, generated in one go without requiring segmented processing.

Seven Language Support: For content creators with overseas needs, this multi-language lip-sync capability is quite practical.

Of course, the final results depend on your specific use case. From real-world test feedback, it performs well in narrative sense, lighting handling, and character consistency, though occasional errors in Chinese text rendering can occur.

How to Start Experiencing

If you want to give it a try, there are several entry points:

Qianwen App: Update to the latest version, and you’ll find the HappyHorse entry at the bottom of the home page. Just tap it to use. Perfect for regular users wanting quick experience.

Official Website happyhorse.cn: More complete features, suitable for professional creators. First-time registration comes with free credits.

Alibaba Cloud Bailian Platform: For enterprise users, supports API access.

The core features are consistent across all three methods, with differences mainly in concurrent numbers, batch operations, and advanced features.

Is It Worth Using for Regular People?

Honestly, it depends on your needs.

If you’re a professional video creator relying on this for work, I suggest comparing the output quality and pricing of several mainstream products first, choosing the tool that best fits your workflow.

If you’re a regular user who occasionally wants to play around with AI video generation, the free credits on Qianwen App are enough for you to experience what “cinema-level” video actually looks like.

If you’re a content creator looking for tools to improve efficiency, pay attention to HappyHorse’s performance on narrative content, especially short video scenarios requiring multi-shot and transition effects.

Alibaba’s move this time is good news for the entire AI video track. Increased competition means users have more choices, and prices will become more reasonable. For regular people, having one more tool to generate videos without filming is definitely not a bad thing.

Want to try it yourself? Let’s go.