Updated: James Cameron’s Avatar: Fire and Ash has reached an estimated $760.4M through Sunday globally. Within that, this return to Pandora is now at $542.7M from the international box office.
The sophomore session added $181.2M overseas amid just a 25% dip (-15% excluding China), and increases in some key markets.
The 20th Century/Disney sci-fi threequel is currently the No. 5 MPA global release of 2025, while the trio of Avatar films have now earned over $6B worldwide.
Fire and Ash is thisclose to topping the $100M milestone in China (sitting at $99.6M through today), and will become only the second Hollywood movie to get there in the market this year, behind Disney’s own Zootopia 2.
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Regarding the latter, the animals have now grossed $1,420.9M worldwide, including $1,099.5M from overseas. This makes Zootopia 2 the first studio movie of 2025 to cross $1B at the international box office.
Z2 is also the top Hollywood global release of 2025, the 3rd studio animated release ever worldwide and the highest-grossing Hollywood animated movie of all time internationally. It has also entered the Top 10 MPA international releases ever. Weekend five added $67.9M across all overseas markets, for a terrific 15% overall drop (-1% excluding China), with five key markets increasing from last frame.
Before we dig into more details on the above, here are some other highlights from the weekend: Paramount’s The SpongeBob Movie: Search for Squarepants opened to $22.1M (including previews) internationally in 76% of the offshore footprint – the global running cume is $60.3M. And, Universal’s Wicked: For Good crossed the half-century mark globally, getting to $504M amid a very slight 17% dip overseas and a domestic increase. Also from Universal, and Blumhouse-Atomic Monster, Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 crossed $100M internationally.
What’s more, and here’s a nice surprise, Sony’s Anaconda with Jack Black and Paul Rudd, debuted to $20M in 58 overseas markets to make it the best international start for a comedy since 2013 on a like-for-like basis at today’s exchange rates. The global running total is $43.7M.
Turning back to the Na’vi, Fire and Ash remains the No. 1 Hollywood movie in all material markets across Europe, Latin America and Asia (except Japan). It’s the highest grossing studio movie of the year in Germany, where it saw a 6% increase over the weekend. As with the Avatar movies in general, there is leg out ahead with such other markets as Korea (+17%), Netherlands (+15%), Hungary (+11%), Colombia (+10%), Austria (+5%), Poland (+5%), and France (+1%) experiencing jumps in the second session. Hong Kong releases on January 8.
The Top 5 markets to date are: China ($99.6M), France ($54.4M), Germany ($43.1M), Korea ($32.1M) and UK ($27.7M).
In Imax, the global total is now $96M.
Further stats on Zootopia 2 include it being the No. 1 film again in Japan and Hong Kong this weekend. It’s the highest-grossing MPA animated release ever in Ukraine and the biggest for Walt Disney Animated Studios in Poland, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Ukraine, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Peru, Paraguay and Bolivia.
For 2025, it’s the biggest studio release in France, Turkey, Ukraine, China, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and Vietnam, among others.
This frame saw significant increases, including in Sweden (+88%), Italy (+60%), Netherlands (+60%), Korea (+33%), Denmark (+23%), Finland (+20%), Spain (+19%), Germany (+7%), Poland (+7%), Singapore (+7%), Indonesia (+6%), Japan (+3%) and Hong Kong (+1%). France was down just 1%.
The Top 5 markets to date are: China ($561.1M), France ($55.9M), Japan ($52.2M), Korea ($49.1M) and Germany ($34M).
The SpongeBob Movie, meanwhile, had its best overseas openings in UK ($3.9M), Mexico ($2.7M), Germany ($2.6M), France ($1.8M) and Israel ($1.7M).
China, Brazil, Italy and Korea release next week.
And, Anaconda started off best in Australia ($2.4M), Mexico ($2.1M), UK ($1.7M), Germany ($1.2M) and Brazil ($1M).
It’s currently tracking 37% bigger than Naked Gun, 19% ahead of Anyone But You and 17% over Daddy’s Home on a like-for-like basis.
Upcoming majors to release include France, Italy, China, Japan and Korea.
In local play, Checco Zalone comedy Buen Camino grossed a very strong $29.3M in Italy since opening on Christmas Day while India’s Dhurandhar has now reached $120.6M global, per comScore.
MISC UPDATED CUMES/NOTABLE
Wicked: For Good (UNI): $4.3M intl weekend (81 markets); $172.3M intl cume/$504M global
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 (UNI): $4.2M intl weekend (78 markets); $101.7M intl cume/$220.6M global
*Marty Supreme (A24): $1.8M intl weekend (2 markets); $1.8M intl cume/$30.1M global
*Song Sung Blue (UNI): $457K intl weekend (19 markets); $457K intl cume/$12.5M global
*Denotes new
So 2B is almost impossible now for avatar.
760m now
Projections from Dec 29 onwards
Domestic – 260m
International – 700m
so 1.8bn at best. I hope it goes well beyon 2bn at least. I love the Avatar movies
So Avatar 3 has better holds than Avatar 2, but still won’t cross $1 billion in 2025.
No but it will in 2026.
It won’t cross 2 billion in 2026 either. Zootopia 2 will very likely out gross it.
“Z2 is also the top global release of 2025…”
Ne Zha 2 would like a word.
That stuck out to me too. Top MPA release maybe but Ne Zha 2 still has $800M on Zootopia 2 and it won’t catch up (though it will narrow the gap quite a bit)
Hahaha Let’s Go ANACONDA! The world is starved for comedy.