List of highest grossing films in the United Kingdom

Top earning films

The highest earners at the box-office are mostly American films and UK-US co-productions. Film series dominate—accounting for twenty-two of the twenty-six films that have earned in excess of £50 million—including six films in the Harry Potter franchise, Peter Jackson's first four Tolkien adaptations, the four Daniel Craig James Bond films and three Star Wars instalments. Fifteen entries are British co-productions and a further four are based on stories and characters created by British writers. This table only charts films released since 1989, but due to inflation it is unlikely anything released prior to then will surpass the films on the list in nominal terms.

Record-holders

Since 1975, twelve films may have set the record as the "highest-grossing" film. Regular tracking of box-office performance only started in 1975, so it is only possible to chart the transition of the record with any serious degree of accuracy within this period. Prior to then, The Sound of Music is accepted to be the record-holder, assuming the record from another musical, South Pacific, in 1966 and going on to treble the earnings of that film. It is possible that some of the earlier films in the chart did not surpass the box office of The Sound of Music, and it may have retained the record until the release of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.

Skyfall, the twenty-third James Bond film in the long-running Eon series, became the first film to gross over £100 million in setting a new record at the box-office. All the record-holders since tracking began have been either partially or fully produced by Americans, although The Full Monty, Mamma Mia!, Skyfall and Star Wars: The Force Awakens were UK-US collaborations. Only the grosses that set records are included in the timeline; earnings from subsequent re-releases after the film conceded the record are omitted.

British productions

The most successful British productions in the modern marketplace generally have American investment, with The King's Speech and The Inbetweeners Movie the only fully British films to have earned in excess of £40 million. Film series still dominate, accounting for twenty-one of the top twenty-six films. The remaining films mostly comprise adaptations of popular novels, stage musicals, television series and biographical films based on renowned historical British figures. The King's Speech replaces Star Wars: The Force Awakens as the most successful British production if the criteria is restricted to solely British-produced films.

Non-English language films

Chinese and Spanish films have achieved the most success at the box-office in the twenty-first century, with three entries apiece among the top ten non-English language performers. The Passion of the Christ, directed by Mel Gibson, is the top performer and Gibson also has another entry in fourth place with Apocalypto; both films feature dead languages. Only the top two films were competitive with the top British films.

Highest-grossing films by box-office admissions

Up to and including 2003, the British Film Institute (BFI) estimate fifty-two sound films have generated over 10 million admissions. The European Audiovisual Observatory (LUMIERE) have been tracking UK admissions since 1996, and they estimate that twenty-two films have generated over 10 million admissions in that period. Due to conflicting estimates, both sets of figures are presented together here in chronological order. While the two datasets are generally consistent with each other, the estimates from LUMIERE are on average slightly lower than those from the BFI, leading to Bridget Jones's Diary being included in the BFI dataset but excluded from the LUMIERE one. The largest discrepancy is in the estimates for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone; there is a difference of 5 million admissions, but LUMIERE do not include any UK data for 2002 while they do for other countries, which may explain the shortfall.

Re-releases also exacerbate the differences in some cases: both Star Wars Episode I and Titanic were successfully re-released in 2012, and while the LUMIERE dataset includes admissions from the reissues the BFI chart does not. While The Lion King did not generate 10 million admissions during its original release, it may have accumulated 10 million admissions due to a re-release: according to the BFI it had generated over 8 million admissions during its first run in 1994, and LUMIERE estimate it generated another 2 million with its 2011 reissue. If Bridget Jones and The Lion King are included, sixty-five sound films in total have generated over 10 million admissions at UK cinemas.

Overview of the twentieth century

In 2004, the British Film Institute published a list charting sound films that generated the most admissions at cinemas in the United Kingdom. The list is reproduced here ranking the top fifty films released in the UK throughout the twentieth century, defined as covering the period from 1 January 1901 until 31 December 2000. The later films that appear on the BFI list—2001 onwards—are omitted from this chart for the purpose of providing an overview of the century. The second table ranks British sound productions from the twentieth century, five of which are co-productions with other countries.

Market conditions, industry practices, demographic and cultural shifts have all impacted on cinema attendance throughout the century. Cinemagoing steadily rose during the 1930s with the arrival of sound and peaked in the 1940s, with 1946 setting a record of over 1,635 million annual admissions; roughly equivalent to thirty visits to the cinema per capita. Attendance dropped off after the Second World War, mainly due to the rising popularity of television. The decline of the cinema was compounded by the rise of home video in the 1980s and reached an all-time low of 54 million admissions in 1984. With declining attendance came the closure of many cinemas; a trend that was not reversed until the birth of the multiplex in the late 1980s, with annual cinema admissions climbing back up to around 176 million in 2002. As expected, the 1940s—when cinema attendance was at an all-time high—is the most represented decade on the chart accounting for nearly a third of all entries, while the 1980s—when attendance was at its lowest—is the least represented post-war decade. However, the disparity between the two extremes is not as great as the overall attendance figures suggest due to the fact that vastly more titles were distributed in the 1940s.

When comparing the films in the chart, several trends emerge. British films comprise half the entries during the 1940s—as opposed to just one entry in the last twenty years of the century—due in part to the British government imposing quota caps on foreign features, as well as the inherent difficulties in importing films during the Second World War. With so many men away on National service, films that performed well were also heavily skewed toward female audiences, exemplified by no fewer than four films headlined by Anna Neagle during this period. Prior to the 1980s when home video became popular, there was also a lot more repeat viewing, with some films during the 1950s and 60s enjoying extended runs—sometimes lasting up to several years—as roadshows. A film's content can also have a prohibitive effect on its success: most films in the chart are either family or children's films, with only two films (The Godfather and A Clockwork Orange) carrying an X rating or its replacement, the 18 certificate, denying entry to minors.

Overall, Gone with the Wind has generated the most admissions at the UK box office with 35 million and Spring in Park Lane is the most successful British sound film with 20 million, while 1938's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is the oldest film in the chart with 28 million admissions. While the chart does not take into account silent films, 1916's The Battle of the Somme is generally regarded to be the most successful film of the silent era, with over 20 million admissions.

Overview of the twenty-first century

Film series and adaptations have been the highest earners in the twenty-first century, with only one film—Avatar in 2009—that is not adapted from a pre-existing property or a sequel emerging as the highest-grossing film of the year. Since the British Film Institute does not regularly track admissions, the only complete metric available for assessing a film's success is the box office revenue, and over a period of time inflation of the currency becomes a key factor when comparing the relative success of films. Ticket prices rose rapidly at the beginning of the twenty-first century, with the average cost increasing by over 50 per cent since 2000. To this end it is useful to adjust the box office gross for inflation, so a chart ranking films by the real value of their earnings is provided alongside a chart of the years' biggest films. After recalculating the grosses using the HM Treasury UK GDP deflator, Star Wars: The Force Awakens remains the most successful film of the twenty-first century.

The Harry Potter series is particularly well represented, topping the year on five occasions with two films present in the adjusted top ten. The James Bond films and The Lord of the Rings trilogy also have a strong presence, with two films apiece among the top ten, adjusted for inflation. Approximately half the films in both charts are British co-productions, while The Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit is based on British source material and Avatar was partially funded by Ingenious Media, a British media investment conglomerate. As per the nominal record, The King's Speech replaces Star Wars: The Force Awakens as the most successful British production of the twenty-first century adjusted for inflation if the criteria is restricted to solely British-produced films.