What They Say
The Motion Picture Association of America published a report about the market in 2021. The combined global theatrical and home/mobile entertainment market reached $99.7 billion, a growth of 24% since 2020, but more importantly, surpassing the pre-pandemic 2019 value. Add in pay TV, and the combined global theatrical and home entertainment market grew six percent from 2020 to $328.2 billion, matching 2019’s record high.
The US also saw good results, with the combined theatrical and home/mobile entertainment market in 2021 reaching $36.8 billion, a 14% increase compared to 2020, but notably overtaking the 2019 figure of $36.1 billion. Streaming globally also continued to boom, with subscriptions in 2020 surpassing the one billion mark, and growing 14% in 2021 to reach 1.3 billion.
The global box office market was $21.3 billion in 2021, up 81% compared to 2020, due to theatre re-openings following the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, but remained well below pre-pandemic levels. Similarly, the U.S./Canada box office market was $4.5 billion in 2021, up 105% from 2020, although still down substantially compared to 2019.
Sources for the data were Omdia and Comscore as well as Box Office Essentials and the DEG.
What We Think
The full 67 page report can be freely downloaded from the link and has some interesting and useful data on regions including Europe as well as the US. It’s not news to see physical distribution shrinking so far, although, bizarrely, I did spot the other day that music CDs actually increased in sales value last year. (BR)
