Happy Oyster is Alibabas answer to OpenAIs dead Sora

Alibaba just dropped a new AI model called Happy Oyster. It was unveiled in Beijing on April 16, 2026. The model generates interactive 3D environments and videos in real time. It is a world model, not just a video generator.

Users describe a scene using text, voice, or image prompts. The scene builds and reacts as the prompts come in. It does not follow the one-shot workflow of write a prompt, wait for rendering, receive a finished clip. Happy Oyster keeps listening and responding throughout the generation process.

The model runs in two modes. Directing mode creates a running physical world where lighting, gravity, character motion, and scene causality stay continuous and coherent. Users can intervene at any moment with text, voice, or image prompts to switch camera angles, direct characters, or change the storyline. Directing mode generates up to three minutes of continuous video at 480p or 720p resolution.

Wandering mode starts from a single text or image prompt and builds an infinitely extendable world. Users explore it in first-person perspective using standard WASD keyboard and camera controls. The world keeps generating and stays coherent as users move beyond the original frame. Wandering mode currently produces one-minute generations at 480p.

Both modes support multimodal inputs and generate full audio and video outputs.

Alibaba ran this model underground before confirming it. It surfaced on the Artificial Analysis benchmark platform under the pseudonym HappyHorse-1.0 and topped the text-to-video and image-to-video rankings. Alibaba later confirmed it was their work.

The timing is notable. OpenAI shut down Sora not long ago. Happy Oyster is filling that space directly. Tencent has its own competing model called Humayun HY-World 2.0, which reconstructs full 3D worlds from video clips. The Chinese AI race between these two is now playing out in real time.

Happy Oyster is available on early access through a waitlist at happyoyster.cn. Developers can also access it via Alibaba Cloud under the Qwen and Tongyi umbrella, or through standard APIs on any hyperscaler cloud.