How iQIYI Built a Scalable Mobile Middle Platform: Architecture, Decoupling, and SaaS Vision

Alibaba’s "Big Middle Platform, Small Frontend" Strategy

In 2015 Alibaba introduced a "big middle platform, small frontend" model to replace siloed "chimney" development. The goal was to eliminate duplicate feature work, break down team silos, and enable long‑term business knowledge accumulation by abstracting common capabilities (user, product, transaction centers) into a shared services department.

iQIYI Mobile App Middle Platform

iQIYI adopted an "apple tree" concept: core content should be reusable to spawn new products (novels, comics, knowledge‑paid services). The middle platform was built in three phases:

Component decoupling – extracting shared components from four pre‑2018 apps that originally shared a single codebase.

Component customization – each app formed its own team while common components were further isolated.

Full platformization – parallel decoupling and platform construction from 2019 onward.

Results: new app development time dropped from three months to two weeks; the "极速版" and international versions achieved the same functionality with only ~20% of the original development effort.

QMAS – iQIYI Mobile Application Studio

QMAS is the foundational portal providing unified access, account management, permission control, and documentation. It aggregates SDKs, component libraries, and backend services, offering a one‑stop solution for onboarding new apps.

One‑click permission requests replace multi‑week email workflows.

Centralized SDK publishing and consumption streamline integration for providers and consumers.

A mobile app scaffolding tool bundles common features, reducing setup time and ensuring consistent infrastructure across apps.

Platform Operations

Interactive Platform : supports branching storylines, interactive dramas, and non‑linear content such as multi‑view variety shows.

User Behavior Analysis Platform : visualizes traffic sources, conversion funnels, and retention metrics to guide product decisions.

R&D Support

A dedicated 10‑person virtual team built a CI/CD middle platform covering project management, packaging, versioning, channel management, and operational monitoring. An SDK management service bridges providers and consumers, enabling easy publishing, testing, and discovery.

Framework Components and High Availability

iQIYI adopted the open‑source Qigsaw framework (inspired by Google Play’s App Bundle runtime) and replaced its runtime with a custom implementation backed by iQIYI’s CDN. This achieved near‑zero crash rates and ~99.5% launch success.

Reliability is ensured by a full‑link monitoring system that aggregates logs from devices, CDN, load balancers, Nginx, HBase, and Elasticsearch, providing real‑time alerts and enabling issue resolution within 20 minutes.

Network Foundations

To improve mobile network stability, iQIYI introduced a custom HTTPDNS gateway and a protobuf‑based long‑connection protocol. Benefits include:

Elimination of SSL overhead on iOS (HTTPS bypass via custom protocol).

Higher resistance to DNS hijacking.

Stable long‑connection reducing TCP three‑way handshake latency.

Domain‑level traffic convergence and faster failover.

These network components, together with the middle platform, enable rapid feature iteration, consistent infrastructure, and scalable SaaS services for internal and external partners.

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