Avengers: Endgame is the highest grossing movie of all time again, with $2,937,323,455 worldwide in Box Office Mojo’s October 11 update, narrowly ahead of Avatar. The list of the highest grossing movies of all time changed twice this year: Spider-Man: Brand New Day entered at third, and a September re-release of Endgame pushed it back past James Cameron’s film.
The short version: Unadjusted, the worldwide top 10 is all from 1997 or later, and three of its films are from 2025 or 2026. Domestically, Brand New Day passed The Force Awakens in September to become the biggest film ever in North America. Adjust for ticket prices and the picture flips: Gone with the Wind, from 1939, leads the inflation-adjusted lists cited below.
The highest grossing movies of all time worldwide
These are Box Office Mojo’s lifetime worldwide grosses, in unadjusted dollars, as updated on October 11. Lifetime figures include every re-release a film has had.
| # | Film (year) | Worldwide gross |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Avengers: Endgame (2019) | $2,937,323,455 |
| 2 | Avatar (2009) | $2,923,710,708 |
| 3 | Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026) | $2,512,865,567 |
| 4 | Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) | $2,334,484,620 |
| 5 | Ne Zha 2 (2025) | $2,270,700,370 |
| 6 | Titanic (1997) | $2,264,812,968 |
| 7 | Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) | $2,071,310,218 |
| 8 | Avengers: Infinity War (2018) | $2,052,415,039 |
| 9 | Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) | $1,921,426,073 |
| 10 | Zootopia 2 (2025) | $1,870,309,291 |
Two newcomers stand out. Ne Zha 2, the 2025 Chinese animated film, sits fifth with $2,270,700,370, and the chart shows that 99% of it came from outside North America, where it took $23,308,176. Disney’s Zootopia 2, also from 2025, is tenth. Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, at $1,779,770,790, is just outside at 11th.
Endgame vs Avatar: how the No. 1 spot keeps changing hands
The race for first has become a contest of re-releases. NPR’s October 6 summary lays out the history. Endgame first took the record in 2019, when its $2.799 billion passed Avatar, which had held the title for ten years. Disney re-released Avatar in 2022 ahead of The Way of Water, and that run, combined with the film’s first release in China, was enough to put it back on top.
This autumn Disney used the same move for Endgame, ahead of Avengers: Doomsday on December 18. The encore opened in North America on the Sept. 25-27 weekend at No. 1 with $26,106,643, according to Box Office Mojo’s actuals, and NPR reported a new worldwide total of $2.9255 billion. By Box Office Mojo’s October 11 figures the gap had widened to roughly thirteen and a half million dollars, by our count. As NPR put it, “It’s a friendly competition — both films are Disney releases.” A future Avatar reissue could flip it back. Our explainer on original-release gross vs lifetime gross shows how much reissues add to these totals.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day and the domestic record
The domestic (U.S. and Canada) list has a new leader. The Hollywood Reporter reported on September 16 that Brand New Day had passed the $936.6 million of 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens after 47 days. Box Office Mojo now shows $956,865,567 for Brand New Day and $936,662,225 for The Force Awakens. The full domestic top 10 is in the right-hand column of the table below.
The inflation-adjusted list: why Gone with the Wind still wins
A dollar in 1939 bought far more cinema seats than a dollar today, so raw grosses tilt every all-time chart toward recent films. Adjusted lists try to correct for that by converting old grosses into today’s ticket prices, and on that basis the leader has been the same for decades.
Filmsite’s inflation-adjusted domestic list, updated through October 2026, puts Gone with the Wind first. It gives the film an unadjusted domestic gross of $200.8 million and an adjusted figure of $1.895 billion as of 2025, against $1.013 billion adjusted for The Force Awakens. The site notes its figures use the 2022 average ticket price of approx. $10.23, “depending on the source.”
| # | Inflation-adjusted domestic (Filmsite) | Unadjusted domestic (Box Office Mojo) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gone with the Wind (1939) | Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026) |
| 2 | Star Wars: A New Hope (1977) | Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) |
| 3 | The Sound of Music (1965) | Avengers: Endgame (2019) |
| 4 | E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982) | Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) |
| 5 | Titanic (1997) | Avatar (2009) |
| 6 | The Ten Commandments (1956) | Top Gun: Maverick (2022) |
| 7 | Jaws (1975) | Black Panther (2018) |
| 8 | Doctor Zhivago (1965) | Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) |
| 9 | The Exorcist (1973) | Avengers: Infinity War (2018) |
| 10 | Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) | Titanic (1997) |
The ranking is old news in the trade. In 2005, Screen Daily reported research from Screen Digest and Box Office Ginca that also put Gone with the Wind first, with an adjusted U.S. gross of $1.26bn, ahead of Star Wars at $1.11bn. Their top 10 contained the same ten films in a slightly different order. Guinness World Records goes further and adjusts worldwide: it credits Gone with the Wind with $3.44 billion, calculated by estimating total tickets sold and multiplying by the current average U.S. ticket price.
The ticket count is the most striking number. According to Guinness, the film sold approximately 202 million tickets in the US during its first three theatrical runs, from December 1939 to November 1943, at a time when the country had about 130 million people. For more on converting grosses into attendance, see our guide to inflation-adjusted box office vs ticket sales.
What these rankings do and don’t measure
Gross is money taken at the box office, not profit; studios share it with theaters, and budgets and marketing come out of what is left, as our explainer on box office vs profit sets out. NPR’s caveat applies to the whole unadjusted chart: the Endgame-Avatar back-and-forth “reflects rising ticket prices more than rising attendance.” Worldwide totals also depend on access to China, which helped Avatar in 2022 and powers Ne Zha 2’s place on the list. Avatar: Fire and Ash, the newest Cameron sequel, is covered in our Fire and Ash ending explainer; it does not appear in the worldwide top 10.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which film is the highest grossing ever?
Avengers: Endgame, with $2,937,323,455 worldwide in Box Office Mojo’s October 11 update, after a 2026 re-release put it back above Avatar at $2,923,710,708. Adjusted for inflation, Gone with the Wind ranks first.
What is the highest grossing movie of all time domestically?
Spider-Man: Brand New Day, with $956,865,567 in the U.S. and Canada on Box Office Mojo. It passed Star Wars: The Force Awakens in September 2026.
Why is Gone with the Wind the highest grossing movie adjusted for inflation?
It sold an enormous number of tickets. Guinness World Records estimates about 202 million U.S. admissions in its first three runs, from 1939 to 1943, when the U.S. population was about 130 million.
Do re-releases count toward a movie’s box office total?
Yes. Lifetime grosses on Box Office Mojo include re-releases, which is how Avatar regained first place in 2022 and Avengers: Endgame took it back in 2026.
Is Titanic still one of the highest grossing movies of all time?
Yes. Titanic is sixth worldwide with $2,264,812,968 and tenth domestically with $674,354,882 on Box Office Mojo, and it is in the top five of Filmsite’s inflation-adjusted domestic list.
Sources
- Top Lifetime Grosses (Worldwide) — Box Office Mojo (IMDbPro), data as of October 11, 2026
- Top Lifetime Grosses (Domestic) — Box Office Mojo (IMDbPro), data as of October 11, 2026
- ‘Avengers: Endgame’ takes the box office crown back from ‘Avatar’ — NPR, October 6, 2026
- Domestic 2026 Weekend 39: estimates vs actuals — Box Office Mojo (IMDbPro), accessed October 11, 2026
- Spider-Man: Brand New Day Beats Force Awakens at Domestic Box Office — Ryan Gajewski, The Hollywood Reporter, September 16, 2026
- Top 100 Box-Office Films of All-Time (Domestic Gross, Adjusted for Inflation) — Tim Dirks, Filmsite, updated through October 2026
- Gone With The Wind named as top grossing film of all time — Wendy Mitchell, Screen Daily, September 5, 2005
- Highest-grossing film at the global box office (inflation-adjusted) — Guinness World Records, accessed October 11, 2026