Avatar Still Holds the Box Office Crown

16 years after the original "Avatar" ushered in the 3D movie era, "Avatar: Fire and Ash" is coming to theaters this week. With a reported budget of more than $400 million, the third installment of James Cameron's eco science fiction epic surrounding the blue Na'vi tribe is among the most expensive movies ever made, and not only 20th Century Studios and its parent company Disney have a lot riding on its success. Coming out at the end of another muted year at the box office, the film is considered a litmus test for the entire movie industry. If it rakes in the desired $2+ billion in global box office sales, studios will take that as a beacon of hope, as a sign that there is still an appetite for big-budget blockbusters in today's landscape. If it doesn't, however, or even worse, if it flops, the industry doomsayers will be louder than ever.

The original "Avatar", released in 2009, raked in an estimated $2.92 billion at the box office globally, making it the highest-grossing movie of all time ahead of "Avengers: Endgame" at $2.8 billion, according to Box Office Mojo. Ranked third is Avatar's 2022 sequel "Avatar: The Way of Water", which brought audiences back to Pandora for a global box office gross of $2.34 billion, making it the most successful movie in the post-Covid era. In fourth position is another James Cameron movie, his 1997 classic "Titanic", which made an eye-watering $2.26 billion at the time, making it the only movie in the top 10 released before 2009.

Following the success of "Avatar", studios happily road the 3D hype train, as it enabled them to add a hefty surcharge to ticket prices, improving their margins, especially on movies that were converted to 3D in post-production at relatively low cost. That was not the case for "Avatar", however, which was designed for and shot in 3D.

It should be noted that the ranking shown in the chart below is not adjusted for inflation and thus heavily favors recent releases over past blockbusters. While "Avatar" and "Titanic" are the only films released before 2010 to feature in the top 10 of the unadjusted ranking, the adjusted ranking (only available for the North American box office unfortunately) features classics such as "Gone with the Wind", the original "Star Wars" and "The Sound of Music". "Avatar" is ranked 15th.