China's 2025 Box Office Up 22% To $7.4bn Driven By Animation

China’s box office increased by 22% to reach $7.4bn (RMB51.83bn) in 2025, compared to $5.8bn the previous year, according to figures from China Film Administration.
 
Two animated titles topped the year-end top ten, raking in $2.8bn between them – Lunar New Year hit Ne Zha 2, which grossed a mighty $2.2bn to become the biggest animation globally of all time, and Disney’s late November release Zootopia 2, which grossed $574m. Disney’s Avatar: Fire And Ash, released on December 19, was the only other US studio film in the year-end top ten, having grossed $110m at the time of writing.
 
Animation accounted for 48.8% of the 2025 box office, according to China Film Administration figures, with two other animated titles also ranking in the top ten – August release Nobody, about four monsters impersonating the heroes of Chinese classic Journey To The West, which took sixth position in the year-end chart, and the latest installment in a long-running Lunar New Year franchise, Boonie Bears: Future Reborn, which ranked ninth (see top ten below).
 
Online ticketing giant Maoyan Entertainment also released a report on the 2025 figures, observing that a total of 57 animation titles were released during the year, which grossed a combined $3.6bn (RMB25bn).
 
Maoyan also reported a marked decline in the number of local films earning in the mid-range box office brackets (RMB100-500m and RMB500m-1bn), underscoring the market’s increasing concentration on blockbuster titles. Four releases grossed more than RMB3bn, while eight surpassed the RMB1bn benchmark.
 
Beacon analyst Chen Jin noted that 2025 was the fifth time that China’s box office had crossed the $7bn (RMB50bn) mark, following 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2023.
 
However, the country’s box office is still some way off the pre-pandemic peak of $9.2bn (RMB64.5bn) in 2019 and has tended to zigzag since the end of the pandemic, with a year of gains followed by a year of losses.
 
More analysis to follow...

CHINA BOX OFFICE 2025 TOP TEN: 

1.Ne Zha 2 (Jan 29) $2.2bn (RMB15.45bn)
 
2.Zootopia 2 (Nov 26) $574m (RMB4.02bn)
 
3.Detective Chinatown 1900 (Jan 29) $516m (RMB3.61bn)
 
4.Dead To Rights (Jul 25) $431m (RMB3.01bn)
 
5.731 (Sep 18) $277m (RMB1.94bn)
 
6.Nobody (Aug 2) $245m (RMB1.72bn)
 
7.The Shadow’s Edge (Aug 16) $181m (RMB1.27bn)
 
8.Creation Of The Gods: Demon Force (Jan 29) $177m (RMB1.24bn)
 
9.Boonie Bears: Future Reborn (Jan 29) $117m (RMB821m)
 
10.Avatar: Fire And Ash (Dec 19) $110m (RMB774m)
 
Source: Maoyan Entertainment