With just over $600 million at the worldwide box office, Superman is one of 2025’s biggest motion pictures. It’s also a significantly bigger hit than usual for a live-action DC Comics movie adaptation. Superman Returns, for instance, couldn’t hit $400+ million in its global theatrical run, ditto Black Adam. The Flash cratered in 2023, as did The Suicide Squad in 2021. While Wonder Woman and Aquaman are global behemoths at the worldwide box office, many DC films have struggled to reach immense box office heights with audiences around the world.
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To illustrate just how big Superman’s become, just look at how well it’s fared compared to typical Batman movies. In its global total, Superman has outgrossed six different installments in the Batman franchise. Entries like Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, The Batman, and the two Dark Knight sequels still handily outgrossed Gunn’s Superman. However, this 2025 superhero film has proven so popular that it’s even towering above several entries in one of the most successful comic book movie sagas of all time.
6) Batman & Robin
With only $238.31 million worldwide (only $107.3 million of which came from domestic audiences), it’s doubtful any solo Batman film will ever sink as low globally as Batman & Robin ever again. Superman zoomed past Batman & Robin’s worldwide gross within its first seven days of global play, a sign of how low the last 20th century Batman film. Not even George Clooney could save this project from financial disarray.
5) Batman Returns
Given its positive modern reputation, it’s weird to remember that Tim Burton’s Batman Returns only made $266.97 million worldwide. However, the film’s darker aesthetic didn’t give it strong legs domestically and international audiences didn’t gravitate towards it as strongly as the first Batman. Thus, it ended up making less than half of what Gunn’s Superman amassed in its global run. In the long run, Batman Returns was culturally victorious. However, initially, its global box office haul left something to be desired.
4) The LEGO Batman Movie
LEGO as a brand isn’t as well-known in many foreign countries as it is in North America. Thus, even the 2014 phenomenon The LEGO Movie did way better in North America than it did overseas. This trend persisted with the film’s sequels, including The LEGO Batman Movie, which made $312.15 million worldwide and $175.75 million domestically. That’s still a great global haul, but it does mean LEGO Batman only made a bit more than half of Superman’s worldwide total.
3) Batman Forever
After the divisive Batman Returns, Warner Bros. executives yearned for the Batman films to head into a more commercial direction. They got just that with the more colorful, youth-skewing Batman Forever. Their plan ended up working, since Batman Forever was the number one live-action movie of 1995 domestically and the fifth-biggest movie of the year worldwide. That mammoth $336.68 million gross in 1995, though, had no chance of standing up to Superman’s $605+ million worldwide gross.
2) Batman Begins
Believe it or not, the Christopher Nolan era of Batman cinema did not begin with a massive financial bang. Batman Begins was a lucrative film, particularly with its $205.34 million domestic total, but its $356.77 million worldwide gross was nowhere near what titles like the Sam Raimi Spider-Man films were pulling in globally. While not quite as big as 1989’s Batman or 2025’s Superman, Batman Begins inspired tremendously positive audience feedback that Nolan would build on with subsequent sequels. Such films would produce worldwide box office hauls that left Batman Begins in the dust, to put it gently.
1) Batman
Among the foundational summer blockbusters still influencing American culture to this day is Tim Burton’s first Batman film from 1989. This Michael Keaton star vehicle was nothing short of a phenomenon as it promised the first big-budget live-action movie version of its titular lead (instead of just a film adaptation of the hit Adam West show like the 1966 Batman film). All the excitement swirling around its release led to a gargantuan $412.81 million worldwide gross and a staggering $252.65 million from just North American theaters. Even before adjusting for inflation, modern DC films like Black Adam and The Flash didn’t come close to matching Batman in worldwide box office numbers. While Superman zoomed past Batman globally, most DC titles never match this historic feature’s box office haul.
Batman is now streaming on HBO Max, Superman is now playing in theaters.
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