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China’s box office presales fall over 60% from last year in crucial Lunar New Year window
Home-grown films lead the charge but fail to meet the phenomenal success of last year’s Ne Zha 2, which attracted record-breaking crowds
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He Huifengin Guangdong
China’s box office presales topped 200 million yuan (US$28.9 million) by Saturday ahead of the coming Lunar New Year holiday, led exclusively by domestic productions – a decline of more than 60 per cent from about 600 million yuan over the same period last year, according to Taopiaopiao, the online ticketing arm of Alibaba Pictures.
Presales are closely watched by distributors and investors as an early indicator of holiday audience demand.
Long seen as a crucial pillar of China’s film market, the Spring Festival season is facing cautious expectations for its 2026 releases, analysts said.
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The holiday season’s box office has expanded dramatically over the past decade, growing from 336 million yuan in 2011 to over 9.51 billion yuan (US$1.37 billion) last year – accounting for nearly one-fifth of annual takings and becoming a crucial determinant of the industry’s full-year trajectory.
That success has also raised the bar. The 2025 Spring Festival season shattered multiple records in China’s film market, attracting 187 million film-goers, making it one of the strongest holiday performances in China’s film history.
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A single domestic animated feature, Ne Zha 2, defined that peak, with 4.8 billion yuan in holiday takings. The film not only captured a dominant share of season revenue but also contributed about 30 per cent of China’s annual box office in 2025.
Against that high base, the overall supply for this year’s Spring Festival season has yet to show comparable breakout potential, independent film producer and commentator Guan Zhi said.
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