Chinese video streaming company IQIYI announced it on March 13, 2025. This announced that a theme park will be opened in Jiangshan, Jiangsu Province, in the second half of the year.
IQIYI
BEIJING – Chinese video streaming platform IQIYI announced on Thursday it will open its first full-fledged theme park in China, based on the characters of its own show.
The upcoming Iqiyi Land is scheduled to open in Jiangshan, Jiangsu Province, just over two hours by high-speed train from Shanghai. The company said the theme parks are primarily based on IQIYI film and TV drama characters, including immersive theatres, interactive film sets and experiences using virtual reality.
It is the latest company to bet that local consumers will spend more on experience despite lukewarm retail sales.
Legoland opened its first Chinese resort in Shanghai this summer, and Warner Bros Discovery announced last month that it will open a “Harry Potter Studio Tour” in the same city in 2027. According to Dianping’s rankings, Chinese toy company Pop Mart opened its themed “Pop Land” in Beijing in late 2023.
IQIYI’s planned theme parks are based on recent successes in VR-specific attractions.
The company has developed technology that combines a VR headset with a mobile platform. Visitors will give the impression that the visitor is walking, on a boat, or sitting in a flying carriage. This means that experiences like theme parks can be compressed into spaces as small as just 57 feet squares.
Since IQIYI’s first dedicated VR experience opened in Shanghai two years ago, the company has worked with business partners to open more than 40 locations in at least 20 Chinese cities. According to the company, one VR experience based on IQIYI’s “Tang Dynasty: Journey to the West” attracted more than 100,000 visitors in its first year.
With VR, gaming and artificial intelligence, Hang Zhang, Senior Vice President of IQIYI, in a Chinese statement translated by CNBC, has enabled the emergence of “distributed” theme parks that allow VR, gaming and artificial intelligence to be more compact, interactive and faster to iterate content.
He said some of the VR-based experiences will first be released at IQIYI Land before they can be released at other venues.
IQIYI shares rose nearly 3% in US trading on Thursday, up 14% so far.
Post-Covid growth
Mainland China’s theme parks are projected to exceed 480 billion yuan ($67 billion) this year, with more than 500 million visitors, according to data shared by the International Recreational Parks and Attractions Association. This is an exponential increase from 303.9 billion yuan recorded at 86 major theme parks in mainland China in 2023, shortly after Covid-19 pandemic control ended, the data shows.
According to the association, the park combines virtual reality to use guests while using AI tools to manage crowds. Parks also added that it combines global intellectual property franchises with China’s domestic narrative.
On Wednesday, the association announced that Disney Parks International directors will be speaking at the Asian Expo in Shanghai this summer.
Disney, which opened in Shanghai’s Disneyland in 2016, reported a 28% increase in international parks and operating profit experience for the quarter ended December 28, in contrast to a 5% decline in the US.
Comcast, which opened in 2021 by Universal Studios Beijing, said it had high revenues in the fourth quarter at international theme parks with low guest attendance at US parks.
A harsh environment
Tourism was a rare bright spot in China’s otherwise inactive consumer market. The consumer price index, a domestic demand indicator, rose just 0.2% last year, while the tourism component rose 3.5%.
This year, China’s plan to promote consumption, particularly in the development of the experience economy. IQIYI previously worked with the local tourism bureau to produce TV drama sets in remote areas of China to attract visitors.
However, content competition remains fierce. IQIYI reported 29.23 billion yuan, down 8% in revenue in 2024, reversing a 10% increase from the previous year.
Theme park projects could also face delays.
Legoland in Sichuan Province, western China, was originally scheduled to open by 2023. When CNBC contacted operator Merlin Entertainment about the project, the company only highlighted the opening of Legoland’s summer in Shanghai this summer.
Disclosure: Comcast is the owner of NBCuniversal, the parent company of CNBC.
