Can you imagine Idli—soft, simple, and the most unassuming star of the breakfast plate—as a nervous wreck? He is miserable. Sambar, once his perfect companion, is leaving him to marry Vada—crisp, golden, and impossible to ignore, with far more swagger. Left on the edge of the plate, Idli can’t help but wonder: when did simple stop being enough?
Social media platforms are flooded with such melodramas, as artificial intelligence (AI) content creators increasingly turn everyday food items into original fictional characters, giving them human-like personalities, emotions, and relationships, and weaving dramatic, over-the-top storylines around them.
Such AI content has emerged as a clever workaround to sidestep copyright and legal risks linked to known personalities—and no real-world sentiments are bruised if Puri elopes with Naan against her father’s wishes. These quirky tales are racking up to 20 million views, captivating audiences while keeping creators out of trouble—unlike recent AI videos featuring historical figures like Mahatma Gandhi or Jalaluddin Akbar, living celebrities, or even Marvel’s Hulk, which sparked copyright backlash.
Lawyers agree that generic AI food videos help creators stay away from legal troubles.
“From a legal standpoint, AI-generated food videos occupy a low-liability corner of a rapidly tightening ecosystem. The real legal exposure today lies in unauthorized use of human likeness and protected characters—areas shaped by the Copyright Act and expanding recognition of personality rights where consent and ownership are key. Generic food imagery triggers neither,” Nakul Gandhi, founding partner at NG Law Chambers, said.
AI food videos have exploded on Instagram, garnering views in millions. A video from @aiobjectstudio that has 66.7K followers shows foxnuts, cardamom, and jaggery-coated chickpeas talking about health benefits. It has 32.1 million views, 998,000 shares, 21,200 comments, and 61,7000 reshares.
Another one from @aifoodstory features a love story between rasmalai and green chili. It got 19.7 million views and 965,000 likes. A similar video from @genifyhappy shows a love triangle between sugar syrup and sweets in a courtroom drama. It has 32.5 million views and 1.5 million shares.
With such food-based videos, there is no identifiable rights holder, no moral rights claim, and no clear infringement hook, making it a frictionless category for creators. “But this regulatory comfort is conditional as India sharpens its approach to synthetic media through the new IT Rules. The focus could widen from what is depicted to how it is disclosed, bringing even harmless AI content into the compliance fold,” Gandhi cautioned.
Creators partner with brands to earn up to ₹10,000 for short-format videos (30-180 seconds). They generate these videos on AI platforms like Google’s Nano Banana, Flow, Veo3 and Kling AI where they use AI credits worth up to ₹500. AI credits are virtual tokens or units that platforms deduct for using AI features. This boost earning potential per video 20 times the investment. Brands are increasingly preferring them to influencer marketing as the quirky-animation format storytelling is both engaging and 30% cheaper.
Take Animation Gyan, for instance. It’s an Instagram page operated by a Dehradun-based engineer that has been uploading food microdramas everyday since January 2025. This enginner, who requested anonymity, said he invests five hours a day after his regular job to create 60-second videos, but his audience demands more. “They are hooked to it as if it is a daily soap,” he said. On a page with 1,00,000 followers, he garners up to 18.2 million views.
He cautions, however, that this may be a passing trend, likely to fade as the AI community moves to the next social media format. He keeps a close watch on his account metrics to stay ahead of the curve.
Marketing industry watchers note that this trend has sparked a wave of content as creators react to these quirky videos and imitate the characters. “Food is a relatable topic for so many people, and the artwork of these characters in AI videos is fun and quirky—just like the superhero AI videos from some time back,” said Piyush Agarwal, co-founder of Mumbai-based social media agency Create.
However, they reiterate that this is likely a short-lived phenomenon. “It sparks reaction videos from influencers, fueling more relatable content. I’ve seen creators jump on it already, but it’ll soon feel stale—the trend will die out fast, as AI crazes always do, forcing creators to pivot to fresh ideas,” Agarwal said.
Ishan Sharma, an AI creator with 1.2 million followers, first noticed a surge in these videos in December. “By February, 60% of videos on my feed were these food AI microdramas and AI videos on inanimate objects, thanks to motion control being launched on AI platfroms like Kling AI and Veo3 that allowed users to use AI to transfer motion and make any image or character move,” Sharma said. He made an explainer on how to create such videos on different AI platforms, getting 2.6 million views on Instagram.
Brands like Google and Zingbus hopped on this trend to experiment with AI videos for marketing on social media. Google created an interview format video with different vegetables to encourage users to tinker with their AI tools and create similar videos. Queries sent to Google remained unanswered.
Intercity bus platform Zingbus collaborated with AI creators on six videos to promote its app, featuring the quirky characters they generate for trend-based marketing. Queries emailed to the company went unanswered.
Create’s Agarwal highlighted that the trend has marketing potential if brands integrate their own stories better with AI. “There’s clear potential for marketing, but brands must craft delightful content and weave into the narrative. Quick commerce players stand to gain big as a natural evolution of meme marketing,” he said.
