Star Wars: The Force Awakens Officially Cuts Down Avatar Domestic Box Office Record

Sorry, Navi, but the Force is not strong with you.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens is now the #1 all-time in domestic box office, surpassing Avatar's $760.5 million, Disney announced in an official press release Wednesday evening based on early box office results. Force passed the figure, from 2009, in a total of just 20 days in North American theaters. Final official numbers will be released Thursday. The movie also passed $800 million in international box office today.

Avatar's record was cast in 336 days, which drives home the real success of Star Wars, which has virtually taken over the box office for the first three weekends and change of its release. Every day from here on out just adds to the total and sets Star Wars that much higher above any future competition. Force now holds over thirty box office records in all.

As to what the end result will be, the sky is the limit. The Force Awakens has one more weekend with a 100% coverage in IMAX theaters, per the Disney/IMAX agreement. Only a couple of wide releases hit this weekend, neither of which should take Force out of the top spot. After that, if you look at our Franchise Movies Release Schedule, you'll see the first film that would likely take it out of #1 is January 29, 2016's Kung Fu Panda 3, which has been advertised in front of the film in most theater formats. That means Star Wars could very well hold #1 at the box office for a total of six weeks before dropping significantly, and moving beyond $800 million, approaching $900 million is possible at the end of that timeframe.

A billion dollars in domestic gross is a possibility, but come February, it'll have more considerable competition from genre and tentpole films. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Deadpool, and Zoolander 2 all hit in the first two weeks of February, taking at least some eyes off.

The all-time worldwide game will be easier to discuss once the movie debuts in China on January 9. So far, international box office has stayed fairly even with, and even surpassed domestic, putting The Force Awakens at a current worldwide total of over $1.56 billion. The worldwide gross record is still held by Avatar at $2.788 billion.