Okay, so ByteDance quietly released [Seedance 2.0](https://flux-context.org/models/seedance) on February 10th, and within hours, it was everywhere. My timeline was flooded with demo clips that honestly made me do a double take — fabric moving with real weight, water splashing with actual physics, and camera transitions that felt like something out of a Netflix production. This thing is wild.
So what makes it different from every other AI video tool out there? For starters, Seedance 2.0 lets you throw up to 12 reference inputs at it simultaneously — images, video clips, audio, you name it. It basically gives you director-level control without needing a film crew. You write a prompt, feed it your references, and the model handles the rest, including generating native audio with lip-synced dialogue and environmental sound effects. The multi-shot generation is probably the most impressive part. You can create sequences that move between different camera angles while keeping characters and settings consistent across scenes. That alone is something creators have been begging for.
The reaction has been massive. [The Information](https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/bytedances-seedance-2-0-video-model-generates-buzz) ran a piece on the buzz, [Yahoo Finance](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/seedance-2-0-launches-director-124700489.html) covered the stock impact, and [Social Media Today](https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/bytedance-launches-impressive-new-ai-video-generation-tool/811776/) called it one of ByteDance’s most impressive launches yet. The financial ripple was real too — Chinese AI stocks surged after the release, with [COL Group hitting its 20% daily trading limit](https://www.scmp.com/tech/article/3342932/bytedances-new-model-sparks-stock-rally-chinas-ai-video-battle-escalates) and Perfect World climbing about 10%. People on social media were straight up calling it “better than Sora 2,” and honestly, based on the demos floating around, it’s hard to argue.
But it hasn’t been all smooth sailing. ByteDance had to [suspend a feature](https://technode.com/2026/02/10/bytedance-suspends-seedance-2-0-feature-that-turns-facial-photos-into-personal-voices-over-potential-risks/) that could generate eerily accurate voice clones from just a facial photo — no voice sample needed. A tech journalist discovered the model could reproduce his voice just from his picture, which is both technically stunning and deeply unsettling. The Jimeng platform (where Seedance 2.0 lives in China) quickly pulled the feature and added verification requirements.
The model is still in a limited beta through Jimeng AI, so most of us can’t fully play with it yet. But the [Hacker News threads](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46949059) are already packed with developers building wrappers and access tools around it. If you’re into AI video at all, this is the one to watch right now. Whether ByteDance can navigate the safety concerns and roll it out broadly remains the big question — but purely on the tech, Seedance 2.0 is the most impressive thing I’ve seen in AI video generation this year.
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