Global cinema attendance drops in 2024

By AFP
May 17, 2025
People watch a movie in the newly opened theater at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California, US June 15, 2021. — Reuters
People watch a movie in the newly opened theater at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California, US June 15, 2021. — Reuters

CANNES, France: Cinema ticket sales fell 8.8 percent worldwide in 2024 from the previous year, marking the first annual drop since the Covid pandemic, the European Audiovisual Observatory (EAO) said in Cannes on Friday.

The decline comes after years of recovery for the industry since the collapse triggered by pandemic restrictions in 2020. “In 2024, a total of 4.8 billion cinema tickets were sold worldwide, generating estimated revenues of 28 billion euros,” Martin Kanzler, a film analyst at the EAO, said in a press conference on the sidelines of annual film festival.

“That is 500 million fewer tickets than in 2023.” Since 2020 -- a disastrous year for cinemas due to health restrictions -- cinema attendance worldwide had been rising. “Perhaps we have reached a new plateau,” Kanzler said.