UK and Ireland box office is forecast to hit £1.19bn ($1.61bn) in 2026 – a healthy 10% rise on 2025, following three years where cinema takings in the territory have essentially plateaued.
That was the message from media measurement and analytics company Comscore, setting the stage at the start of the UK Cinema Association’s two-day annual conference this week (May 12-13). Film data and insights specialist Gower Street Analytics provided the 2026 forecast.
Lucy Jones, executive director at Comscore Movies, also revealed that UK and Ireland box office is tracking 16% up on 2025 for the year to date (to May 10).
At the end of April, that rise was only 7% up for the first four months of the year. However, takings have surged in the past two weeks thanks to sustained success from releases such as Universal’s Michael and Disney’s The Devil Wears Prada 2 – lifting the year-to-date numbers.
Total UK and Ireland box office in 2023 and 2024 was £1.06bn ($1.43bn at current exchange rates), and in 2025 it was £1.07bn ($1.45bn).
Speaking to delegates largely drawn from the UK’s cinema exhibition industry, Jones emphasised the depth and diversity of the films engaging audiences during the year to date, with January, February, March and April all showing a varied mix of hit film releases – for example, top titles The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, Michael and The Drama in April. Michael is forecast to gross almost £60m ($81m) lifetime, said Jones.
Sharing insight from Gower Street, Jones was unable to reassure exhibitors that 2026 will even out the perennial peaks and troughs in the release calendar.
Despite the FIFA World Cup continuing to July 19, the month of July is set to yield a robust four titles grossing at least £10m ($13.5m): Universal’s Minions & Monsters and The Odyssey, Disney’s live-action Moana and Sony’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
August has no £10m-plus hits forecast (although July releases should play through the school summer holiday), and September just one: Aardman’s Shaun The Sheep: The Beast Of Mossy Bottom, released by Studiocanal for Sky Cinema.
In December, Disney’s Avengers: Doomsday, Warner Bros’ Dune: Part Three, and Sony’s Jumanji: Open World – all released over the six days December 18-23 – are expected to account for three of the 10 biggest box-office hits of the year in the territory.
Worldwide picture
Success at the UK and Ireland box office so far in 2026 is being echoed by territories around the world. According to Comscore data, North America box office is up 13% on the year to April 30; Australia is also up 13%; Germany is up 28%; and Italy is up 22% (all measured in local currencies). In France, admissions for the period are 21% up on 2025.
The major markets in Europe all have a local title in their year to date top five: family comedy Marsupilami in France (5.9 million admissions); dark comedy Extrawurst in Germany (€20m/$23m); comedy Buen Camino in Italy, released last Christmas (€40m/$47m in 2026 and €76m/$89m lifetime); and comedy sequel Torrente, Presidente in Spain (€26m/$30m).
In UK and Ireland, the highest-ranked local film is Hamnet, which ranks seventh for the year to date with £19m ($26m).
PostTrak data
Jones shared data from Comscore’s PostTrak exit polling, showing instances of correlation between UK and Ireland box office and percentage of adult audiences rating films excellent – as is the case with Project Hail Mary, Michael and Hamnet, for example. The Super Mario Galaxy Movie and Wuthering Heights are examples of films achieving strong box office despite only average to excellent ratings from their audiences.
However, when children were surveyed, there was very little correlation between box office outcomes and the percentage that rated the film “great”.
“I guess the upshot is you don’t need to bother making a good film for kids,” suggested Jones, wryly. “There is just a massive appetite for families to go to the cinema. They really want to go. There’s never enough kids’ films, and they’re a kind of guaranteed audience for a lot of these films.”
PostTrak surveyed audiences with the question: “What types of adverts have you seen or heard before today that made you want to see the film in the cinema?” Scoring best (both at 20% of respondents) were cinema posters/display and in-cinema trailers. Recommendations from friends or family rank third at 18%, with YouTube on 17%.
The biggest growth is in TikTok – not included as a possible answer when PostTrak began asking this question in 2019, and now mentioned by 16% of respondents. Over the same period, Instagram has grown from 9% to 13% in survey answers, and Twitter/X from 4% to 8%. Moving in the other direction since 2019: TV advert (down from 19% to 11%).
PostTrak surveyed the age of audiences. Among titles surveyed, The Moment, Scream 7, You, Me And Tuscany and – perhaps surprisingly – legacy sequel The Devil Wears Prada 2 had the youngest audiences among adults, with at least 50% aged under 25.
H Is For Hawk, Glenrothan, Mother’s Pride, Neil Diamond-themed Song Sung Blue and Elvis Presley concert documentary EPiC saw the oldest audiences, with at least 40% aged over 45. Glenrothan, Michael, EPiC, Iron Lung and Giant saw the highest percentage of infrequent cinemagoers, with at least 15% attending the cinema only once or twice a year.
Films strongly engaging cinemagoers attending in groups (of three or more) included Wuthering Heights, The Moment, Scream 7, The Devil Wears Prada 2 and You, Me and Tuscany. Michael had the highest number attending in a group of six or more (7%).
The UK Cinema Association’s conference, “Retention, Reach, Revenue – Growing Cinema Audiences” was presented at Vue Westfield in London.
