How do you determine which is the highest grossing film?

Avatar is often said to be the "highest-grossing" film, taking $2.8 billion at the box office.

However these claims do not take account the other ways a film can money including home video, television income.

These can form a significant portion of a film's earnings.

Titanic earned $1.2 billion from video and DVD sales and rentals, in addition to the $2.2 billion it grossed in theatres.

While complete sales data is not available for Avatar, it earned $345 million from the sale of sixteen million DVD and Blu-ray units in North America, and ultimately sold a total of thirty million DVD and Blu-ray units worldwide.

After home video income is accounted for, both films have earned over $3 billion.

When a film is highly exploitable as a commercial property, its ancillary revenues from merchandising can dwarf its income from direct film sales.

Pixar's Cars earned $461 million in theatrical revenues, which was only a modest hit by comparison to other Pixar films but generated global merchandise sales of over $8 billion in the five years after its 2006 release, the most revenue ever generated by a franchise consisting of a single film.


1     Avatar      $2,782,275,172     2009

2     Titanic     $2,186,772,302     1997     

3     The Avengers     $1,518,594,910     2012

4     Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2     $1,341,511,219     2011

5     Iron Man 3     $1,215,439,994     2013     

6     Transformers: Dark of the Moon     $1,123,794,079     2011     

7     The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King     $1,119,929,521     2003     

8     Skyfall     $1,108,561,013     2012     

9     The Dark Knight Rises     $1,084,439,099     2012     

10     Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest     $1,066,179,725     2006     

11     Toy Story 3     $1,063,171,911     2010

12     Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides     $1,043,871,802     2011

13     Jurassic Park     $1,029,153,882     1993     

14     Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace     $1,027,044,677     1999

15     Alice in Wonderland     $1,024,299,904     2010

16     The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey     $1,017,003,568     2012     

17     The Dark Knight     $1,004,558,444     2008

18     Frozen film currently playing     $1,000,236,000     2013     

19     The Lion King     $987,483,777     1994     

20     Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone     $974,755,371     2001 - Online