Mario, Michael & Mary Catapult Global Box Office to $2.63bn in April

May 10, 2026

Don’t stop till we get enough! In contrast to last year there was no need to kickstart the theatrical year in April this time. Nevertheless, April continued to be a very good time at the global box office, with the exception of China. This is thanks especially to three titles: THE SUPER MARIO GALAXY MOVIE, MICHAEL and holdover PROJECT HAIL MARY.

As over the first three months of the year the International (excluding China) and Domestic markets-combined performed at the top end of the decade. They recorded the second highest grossing April since 2019 (-13%) with $2.48 billion. It’s nearly on par (-0.6%) with April 2023, when the first SUPER MARIO MOVIE reigned. It’s clearly up (+13%) on last year, when A MINECRAFT MOVIE made its debut.

The total Global box office at the end of April is estimated at $10.6 billion. This remains weighted down significantly by the consistently poor Chinese performance which is currently tracking behind 2025 (-5%) and 2023 (-3%), but +5% ahead of 2024. The Global box office is further -23% (or $3.2 billion) below the average of the last three pre-pandemic years (2017-2019) at current exchange rates. Excluding China, the global year to date would be the best since 2019 (-15%), up on all years (2025: +17%; 2024: +19%; 2023: +6%, 2022: +47%).

GBOT April 2026

Top Titles

The four highest grossing global movies in April contributed a combined box office of $1.56 billion! This represents 59% of the month’s global total.

A bit over half of this amount was delivered by Universal’s THE SUPER MARIO GALAXY MOVIE. The sequel grossed a massive $855 million within the month, quickly becoming the highest grossing release this year so far.

In a neck-and-neck race, Lionsgate’s biopic of Michael Jackson was the second highest grossing global movie of the month. MICHAEL, which was internationally distributed by Universal, earned an impressive $297 million within the month.

Only marginally behind MICHAEL, last month’s highest grossing title PROJECT HAIL MARY claimed #3 globally this month adding approximately $296 million for an impressive $624 million cume at the end of April. At the beginning of May the Amazon MGM release surpassed THE MARTIAN ($631m), which is also based on a book by HAIL MARY author Andy Weir.

The #4 highest grossing global movie in April was A24’s THE DRAMA with an impressive $111 million. With MARTY SUPREME ($191m) becoming the #1 of the studio earlier this year, A24 is enjoying a remarkable run.

International box office (excluding China)

The International box office (excluding China) continued to have a strong 2026 in April. The region generated 62% of the global total by grossing $1.6 billion. It’s the fourth highest grossing month of the past twelve and the highest grossing April since 2019 (-11%), slightly up (+2%) on the same month in 2023 and only -9% behind the pre-pandemic benchmark. It is also a significant +24% ahead of the same period last year. It’s the fifth month in a row that records a year-on-year growth, the fourth in double digits (Jan: +15%, Feb: +16%, Mar: +23%). Further, seven of the past 8 months have performed better than the same month in the prior year!

Domestic

The Domestic market had a good April. By grossing $861 million it delivered the fourth highest grossing month of the past twelve. It had the narrowest gap to the three-year average since August last year being -10% down. Nevertheless, it’s only the third best April of the decade. Trailing the peak month in 2023 (-5%) and down slightly on the month last year with -2%. That is only rank #17 of our tracked top 20 markets, while being solidly at #10 for the gap to pre-pandemic benchmark.

For the first time since July last year a movie grossed more than $300 million within a month. THE SUPER MARIO GALAXY MOVIE even got close to $400 million with its $391 million. Two more titles broke the $100 million bar in April with PROJECT HAIL MARY adding $133 million for a $310 Million cume and MICHAEL grossing $130 million. This was the highest number of movies over $100 million within a month since December last year. In the months from January until March combined only three movies crossed the $100 million mark. The top 3 movies had a commanding 76% market share. This very top-heavy performance left only seven movies grossing more than $10 million in the month overall. That is the lowest number since December 2022!

At the end of April, the Domestic cume for the running year is at $2.65 billion. Supported by the overall positive performance of the Domestic market in April, the gap to the three-year average has narrowed from -35% at the end of March to -28% a month later. The cume runs +13% ahead of last year at the same time and -1% below the period in 2023, the peak of this decade.

China

In contrast to most of the world China had a disastrous April. Even worse than the very bad one last year ($171m). With a total of only $149 million, it’s the lowest grossing month in China since November 2022 ($82m). It’s further the fifth lowest grossing month in China since the cinemas properly re-opened in August 2020. No title grossed more than the $24 million of local drama IT’S OK at #1. In total only five movies even got over $10 million.

The poor performance of this April is even more severe given how poorly China has performed so far this year. The year-to-date total of $1.88 billion is the lowest of the decade with the exception of the main cinema shut down year 2020. It’s down in double digits on all years since 2021 at the same point in time (2025: -49%; 2024: -31%; 2023: -30%, 2022: -11%, 2021: -37%). The gap to the pre-pandemic benchmark grew from -30% to -40% over the month of April. The second worst of the tracked top 20 major markets.

Outlook

April continued the positive development of the year so far. Operating across the majority of territories worldwide at the top end and beyond decade best performances. That this was driven also by two new original movies with MICHAEL and THE DRAMA combined with the holdovers of PROJECT HAIL MARY is promising. Additionally, THE SUPER MARIO GALAXY MOVIE was able to give MARIO the second global box office hit and establish the franchise further in the theatrical world.

The supply of hits stayed more diverse as well in April. MICHAEL gave Lionsgate its second break out of the year. After the $400 million of THE HOUSEMAID, which is their #9 highest grossing movie ever globally, MICHAEL is on its way to enter the top 4, which is currently dominated by THE HUNGER GAMES franchise and the final TWILIGHT entry from more than ten years ago. Further THE DRAMA is A24’s second hit of 2026. The prestige studio has therefore released two of their four highest grossing movies ever this year.

May is likely to walk further on a high. THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2 already kicked off the month strongly. Later in the month one of the biggest franchises of all time sees a new release with STAR WARS: THE MANDALORIAN AND GROGU.