2026 Worldwide Box Office Headed To Near $36B, Best Since 2019

Box office authority Gower Street Analytics has revised their 2026 annual global ticket sales forecast to $35.7 billion, up 2.9% from their previous estimate which they reported at April’s CinemaCon.

Their forecast is based on Rentrak actuals and Gower estimates.

If the global B.O. hits $35.7B, that will rep a 6.3% uptick from last year’s haul and the best since 2019’s $42.3 billion tally.

This year’s forecast is comprised of a $10.5B North American projection, $19.7 billion from international markets excluding China and $5.5 billion from China. “Those figures would be an 18% hike for domestic over 2025, a nearly 14% jump for international sans China and about a 26% slide for China which has had a softer year so far as admissions and ticket prices have dropped (though horror has been having something of a heyday there),” says the latest Global Rentrak Substack.

It’s been a gangbusters year for Hollywood around the globe with five billion-plus grossing titles including Sony/Marvel’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day ($2.5B), The Odyssey ($1.8B), Toy Story 5 ($1.1M), Michael ($1B) and Super Mario Galaxy Movie ($1B). There’s also been massive horror breakouts in indie fare such as Obsession ($525M) and Backrooms ($400.6M). China has had a massive hit in the race car franchise pic, Pegasus 3 which zoomed to a near $654M. In addition they had Kung Fu Soccer ($349M) and Once Upon a Time in the Middle East ($356M).

This past summer delivered an all-time record in North America with $4.76B per Rentrak in addition to the best global figures with $14.5B since 2019’s $14.9B.

Still ahead in the 2026 calendar are such movies as Toho’s Godzilla Minus Zero which GKids is releasing stateside, Warner Bros’ The Cat in the Hat, Lionsgate’s The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, Focker-in-Law (on which Universal has domestic and Paramount international), Disney’s Hexed, Warner Bros’ Dune: Part Three, Disney/Marvel’s Avengers: Doomsday and Sony’s Jumanji: Open World.