The 5 Biggest Domestic Box Office Opening Weekends In Movie History (Including ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’)

Box office records rarely stay in place for long, but the numbers put up over the past several years have redefined what a blockbuster opening actually looks like. The conversation reignited this past weekend when ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ stormed into theaters and rewrote the record books in the process.

With ticket sales this large, it is worth stepping back and looking at where the film actually lands among the biggest openings of all time. Here are the five biggest domestic box office debuts ever recorded, based on final confirmed numbers rather than early estimates.

‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’

‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ opened to a confirmed $360 million domestically once Monday actuals came in, officially surpassing ‘Avengers: Endgame’ as the biggest domestic debut in box office history. Sony Pictures’ new movie earned $360 million from 4,487 North American screens in Monday actuals, which is up from the $355 million that the studio had projected on Sunday.

‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ and ‘Avengers: Endgame’ now stand as the only two movies in history to cross $300 million in a single weekend. The film’s revised global opening reached $932 million, which stands as the second best worldwide opening at the box office behind ‘Avengers: Endgame’s $1.22 billion.

The film stars Tom Holland and Zendaya, with a supporting cast that includes Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal and Mark Ruffalo, and was directed by ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’ filmmaker Destin Daniel Cretton. The film has earned strong reviews, holding a 90 percent critics score on Rotten Tomatoes and an A CinemaScore rating from audiences.

The blockbuster opening helped deliver the biggest weekend ever for North American movie theaters, with an estimated $430 million in total ticket sales. Sony Pictures chairman Tom Rothman celebrated the milestone in a statement following the record breaking run.

‘Avengers: Endgame’

Before this past weekend, ‘Avengers: Endgame’ held the record for the biggest domestic opening in history, a mark it set back in 2019. The film’s previous record stood at $357.1 million in its domestic opening from April 2019, a start that for years had seemed to be an impossible one to beat.

The film’s global reach was just as significant as its domestic haul. ‘Avengers: Endgame’ remains the biggest worldwide debut of all time, having launched to $1.2 billion globally, a benchmark few films achieve by the end of their entire theatrical run.

Even with ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ now ahead of it domestically, ‘Avengers: Endgame’ still holds a distinction that no film has managed to top. Its worldwide opening remains the largest ever recorded, and it stands alongside ‘Brand New Day’ as one of only two films to cross the $300 million threshold in a single domestic weekend.

‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’

‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ held its own place in box office history well before ‘Brand New Day’ arrived, and it remains the third biggest domestic opening ever recorded. The film’s opening weekend total of $260.1 million from 2021 trails only the two record setting Marvel releases that came after it.

The gap between the top two openings and the rest of the field is significant. Both ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ and ‘Avengers: Endgame’ earned around $100 million more to start than the third and fourth largest domestic openings.

‘No Way Home’ had previously broken Sony’s own studio record for a domestic launch, a mark that stood until ‘Brand New Day’ arrived years later. Its place on this list underscores just how consistently the Tom Holland era of ‘Spider-Man’ has dominated opening weekend charts across the industry.

‘Avengers: Infinity War’

‘Avengers: Infinity War’ held the all time domestic opening record for exactly one year before ‘Avengers: Endgame’ took the crown from it. On the same release weekend the following year, ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ had grossed $257.6 million, breaking the record for the highest opening weekend ever, a record that lasted officially one year minus a day.

The film’s launch was historic for more than just its domestic total. ‘Infinity War’ earned $257.6 million in its North American launch, topping the $247.9 million made by ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens.’

Beyond the domestic figure, ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ also set the record at the time for the biggest global opening weekend, a run that helped push the Marvel Cinematic Universe further into uncharted commercial territory heading into its two part finale.

‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’

Rounding out the top five is ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens,’ the film that held the domestic opening weekend record before the Marvel Cinematic Universe took over the top spots entirely. The film set the record for the biggest all time debut and biggest December debut with $247.966 million, propelling the industry to the biggest overall moviegoing weekend of all time at that point.

‘The Force Awakens’ also set records well beyond North America upon its release. The film posted the highest global opening weekend of all time at that point with $528.967 million, and surpassed $1 billion in a record 12 days.

Directed by J.J. Abrams, the film reintroduced the ‘Star Wars’ saga to a new generation and held its domestic opening record for over two years before ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ finally surpassed it in 2018. Its presence on this list, nearly a decade after its release, speaks to how rare it is for any film to crack the top five at all.

With ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ now sitting atop this list, it raises the question of just how much higher opening weekends can climb, and whether Marvel’s slate of upcoming Avengers films might be the next to make a run at the record. Which of these five openings do you think will still be standing five years from now?