Surprising 2024 Box Office Stats Confirm Netflix Is Hollywood’s Modern King

Overall, 2024 was a mixed year at the box office. It started off on a terrible note, as the first half of the year was filled with failures, disappointments, and films that just couldn’t handle the load after the 2023 SAG and WGA strikes completely upended the release calendar. Fortunately, things turned around in the second half of the year blockbuster movies like Wicked, Deadpool and the Wolverine, and Inside Out 2, turning the tide. Despite all this, the global box office ended well below 2023, slowing the industry’s recovery from the 2020 lockdown. At the same time, streaming’s place as the future was more firmly established.

According to Gower Street Analytics (via Deadline), the worldwide box office total in 2024 was $30 billion, up from $33.9 billion in 2023. That figure includes $8.75 billion in domestic ticket sales, which was less than in 2023, when the number exceeded $9 billion. In light of the strikes and slow start last year, that number could have been much worse. There’s a lot to say about this, and we’ll go into all of that a little further now. But there is one interesting statistic that helps put it all into perspective; namely, Netflix’s total revenue for the fiscal year ending September 2024 was $37.5 billion (or, in other words, 25% more than last year’s total worldwide box office).

It’s definitely an apples-to-oranges equation, as Netflix is ​​a subscription streaming service that offers both movies and TV shows to attract customers. Still, if there was any question about which part of the business is most important to Hollywood’s future, there shouldn’t be.

It’s also clear that Netflix is ​​the king of the streaming wars despite being one of many competitors in this space. That’s not to mention Disney+, Hulu, Max, Paramount+ or Peacock, not to mention smaller services like Shudder. Together, broadcast absolutely eclipses the theatrical market.

While revenue doesn’t equal profits, Netflix has been very profitable of late, posting more than $17 billion in revenue for the fiscal year ending in September 2024. This is 31% more than in the previous year. Meanwhile, many theater chains are struggling just to keep the lights on Parent company Regal Cineworld went bankrupt in 2022 and AMC, the largest theater chain in the world, currently saddled with billions in debt. Last year also saw a dramatic development Sony Pictures bought the popular movie theater chain Alamo Drafthouse. This may help the company survive, but it also means that a major studio is now directly investing in theaters, which complicates the situation.

This may help explain why Netflix is ​​so reluctant to release its movies in theaters, even if movie theater owners would welcome Netflix movies with open arms (under the right conditions). A streamer usually only releases their movies in theaters to make sure they qualify for awards and/or to please certain directors. He just doesn’t care about cash.

With all that said, the box office is still extremely important to the future health of the movie business, including streaming. We’ve seen time and time again that movies released in theaters perform better on streaming video. This is pretty much a universal rule, even if the film in question is a theatrical flop. for example Nicolas Cage’s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent recently entered Netflix’s top 10 charts two and a half years after its theatrical release. So yes, Netflix originals like Back in Action will have their moment in the sun, but will they have the same staying power? Even at this very moment, the top 10 Netflix movies are dominated by Despicable Me, Hotel Transylvania 2, Trolls Band Together, and Baby Boss.

So yes, streaming is definitely the future of Hollywood, and until something drastically changes, Netflix is ​​the king of that future. But without a healthy theatrical market, it will be harder to sustain Hollywood. Studios need that revenue, and more importantly, movies need the word of mouth they get in theaters. It remains a symbiotic relationship, even if one side of the equation is clearly the dominant force.