UK’s National Cinema Day sees admissions reach one million, down a third year-on-year

The UK’s National Cinema Day saw admissions drop by a third from 2023, with one million admissions from cinemas taking part in the event, according to figures from box office analyst Comscore.

In 2023, 1.56 million admissions were recorded.

Total box office takings in the UK on Saturday stood at £4m, 13% down on the 2023 figure of £4.7m. In 2022, 1.46 million admissions were achieved in a single day, bringing in £4.4m at the box office.

This year’s National Cinema Day saw tickets start at £4, compared to £3 in the two previous iterations.

Last year benefitted from a strong summer release schedule, with Warner Bros’ Barbie, Sony’s The Equalizer 3 and Universal’s Oppenheimer the best performing titles.

This year, National Cinema Day fell on a weak weekend for new releases. Holdover family films performed well, with the most popular films on the day being Universal’s Despicable Me 4, on its eighth weekend; Disney’s Inside Out 2, on its 12th weekend; Disney’s Deadpool & Wolverine, on weekend six; Sony’s It Ends With Us, on weekend four; Disney’s Alien: Romulus, on weekend three, and Trafalgar Releasing’s 15th anniversary re-release of the animation Coraline, also on weekend three.

The widest new releases of the weekend was André Rieu’s 2024 Maastricht Concert: Power Of Love playing in 649 locations for Piece of Magic, followed by Chris Weitz’s horror Afraid, at 450 sites.

Odeon, Cineworld, Vue, Picturehouse, Showcase and Curzon were among the operators taking part.

National Cinema Day was developed by the cross-industry body Cinema First and supported by the Film Distributors’ Association and the UK Cinema Association.

• ‘Despicable Me 4’ regains UK-Ireland box office lead in eighth weekend boosted by National Cinema Day; ‘Andre Rieu’ opens in top five