Some are wondering why the Superman 2025 box office projections have been lowered within the last few weeks before the movie releases nationwide on July 11. Multiple reports that relay box office tracking numbers for summer blockbusters have all slightly lessened their predictions for the James Gunn-directed film. In May, the projection by an insider was $166 million to $175 million domestically, but the latest figures have it teetering somewhere between $90 and $145 million depending on the source. Fortunately, a new report has provided an explanation for the reduced projections.
What are Superman 2025’s expected box office predictions now?
The expected box office predictions for Superman 2025 are between $135 million and $175 million for the opening weekend and between $370 million and $482 million overall dometically.
These figures come from a report compiled by Box Office Theory on June 20. As a point of comparison, the analytics site stated in a June 6 report that the film’s opening weekend would be between $154 million and $185 million, with the overall domestic box office to range from $395 million and $510 million. This mirrors the new range of $125 million and $145 million from the National Research Group, though insiders at Warner Brothers and DC Studios believe that sales will more conservatively run from $90 million to $125 million.
The website explains that while it is still “bullish” on the film’s performance at the box office, they wish to “account for potential over-indexing of social media metrics or expected pre-sale pathing.” In particular, it notes that the current Summer 2025 release schedule is “flooded” as customers have to decide on buying tickets for multiple blockbusters. This includes The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which releases two weeks later on July 25, as well as Jurassic World Rebirth on July 2, I Know What You Did Last Summer on July 18, Smurfs also on July 18, and The Bad Guys 2 on August 1.
The reports admits that the film still shows “early signs of strong post-Thursday business relative to the front-loaded nature of recent midsummer comic book tentpoles,” though its overall sales “will be determined by final marketing and word of mouth/reviews.”
On that front, international fans who were lucky enough to watch the first 30 minutes of the movie have praised the film thus far, with many saying that the tone of the movie is “180 degrees away from” Man of Steel. That said, these reactions should be taken with a grain of salt, particularly since detailed reviews from viewers and critics on the entirety of the film have yet to be printed.
Meanwhile, the site has slightly increased its opening weekend projections for The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which was initially $125 million to $136 million and is now $125 million to $155 million. This puts these two battles into a more direct head-to-head battle than expected.
It should be noted that Superman 2025’s early access sales through Amazon Prime was Fandango’s best first-day advance ticket seller for the year. While that is indeed impressive, the site previously shaved off some of the film’s opening weekend ticket sales due to this, as the early access screenings were slated to air on July 8, a few days before the film’s release. Given that these screenings are a relatively new offer, its impact on early sales is still unclear.
An insider revealed in early June that the apparent budget for Superman 2025 was $225 million and that the film will need to cross the $500 million mark in overall sales to break even, $700 million if it is to be considered a successful hit. So while this new report has somewhat lowered its expectations, the film still looks on track to meet that goal.
