Domestic Box Office Falls to $8.75 Billion in 2024 as Movie Theaters Struggle to Recover From Strikes

Not even the dynamic duos of Joy and Anxiety, Deadpool and Wolverine, Gru and his minions or Paul Atreides and those massive sandworms could push the 2024 box office to pre-pandemic heights.

Domestic ticket sales have wound up at $8.7 billion for the year, down than 3.3% from 2023 (when revenues hit $9.04 billion) and 23.5% from 2019 (when revenues reached $11.3 billion), the last normal year at the box office, according to Comscore. Admissions, expected to hit approximately 800 million, also declined from pre-COVID heights of roughly 1.3 billion. It’s the first post-pandemic year that overall revenues didn’t improve upon the last, though box office prognosticators attribute the downturn to the lighter release schedule that resulted from 2023’s actors and writers strikes.

“The 2024 box office was healthy for six months, and unhealthy for the other half. During the summer and year-end, big franchise series worked and records were broken,” says David A. Gross, who runs the movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research. “But the first four-and-a-half months of the year and the autumn were weak. Dead periods in 2024 left some deep bruises.”

Disney‘s “Inside Out 2” was the year’s biggest movie, earning a mighty $652 million domestically and $1.69 billion globally. After a rough stretch in 2023, the Magic Kingdom enjoyed a considerable rebound as “Deadpool & Wolverine” ranked as the No. 2 movie with $1.33 billion worldwide and “Moana 2” as the fourth-biggest with $900 million to date (and expectations to surpass the $1 billion mark in January). If the “Moana” sequel can power above Universal’s “Despicable Me 4” ($969 million), Disney will have fielded the three highest-grossing releases of 2024 — the first time it’s done that in the post-COVID era. These wins helped Disney return to No. 1 in terms of studio marketshare, with $2.2 billion domestically and a staggering $5.46 billion globally, after ceding the crown to Universal in 2023. Disney is the first studio to surpass $5 billion worldwide since 2019.

“We were very optimistic coming into this year and felt that our slate was very high quality and also well-rounded,” said Disney Entertainment’s co-chairman Alan Bergman. “Ultimately the films performed far beyond our highest expectations, and I couldn’t be more proud of our teams.”

Nine of the biggest movies of the year were sequels while the only original movie in the top 10 was “Wicked,” which was adapted from the smash Broadway musical. After “Inside Out 2,” “Deadpool & Wolverine,” “Despicable Me 4” and “Moana 2,” the highest-grossing films were Warner Bros. and Legendary’s “Dune: Part Two” ($714 million), Universal’s “Wicked” ($643 million to date), Warner Bros. and Legendary’s “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” ($571 million), Universal’s “Kung Fu Panda 4” ($547 million), Sony’s “Venom: The Last Dance” ($476 million) and Warner Bros.’ “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” ($451 million). By comparison, none of 2023’s top three releases — “Barbie,” “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” and “Oppenheimer” — were based on existing film franchises.

“Family movies had a terrific year and are the worldwide box office champ,” says Gross. “New, original stories had an off year, particularly after 2023’s successes. There were some interesting stories from interesting filmmakers, but very little of it connected with audiences.”

Universal, buoyed by “Despicable Me 4,” “Wicked,” “Kung Fu Panda 4” and “Twisters,” ranked No. 2 in terms of marketshare with $1.89 billion domestically, down 3% from 2023, and $3.75 billion globally. Warner Bros. landed in third place with $1.164 billion, a 17% decline from last year as “Dune” and “Godzilla x Kong” soared while “Joker: Folie à Deux” and “Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1” tanked on the big screen.

With “Venom 3,” “Bad Boys: Ride or Die” and “It Ends With Us,” Sony trailed at No. 4 with $1.007 billion domestically and $2.4 billion globally, about even with the studio’s 2023 grosses. Meanwhile Paramount, whose major titles were “Gladiator 2” and “Sonic the Hedgehog 3,” rounded out the top five with $879.5 million, up 5% from last year.