Spider-Man: No Way Home's Staggering Reported Profit Revealed

Spider-Man: No Way Home wasn't just a billion-dollar hit for Sony and Marvel – it was also wildly profitable! In a new report breaking down how movie theaters are still thriving in the era of streaming, Spider-Man: No Way Home is being held up as a shining example of what big movie franchises can still achieve through the theatrical model. Spider-Man: No Way Home ended up earning nearly $1.9 billion at the worldwide box office ($804.3 million domestically); according to the latest estimates, No Way Home ended up netting over $610 million in profit for the studios! 

Sony Pictures is being put under an especially bright spotlight as it remains the only studio in the business not to have its own streaming service. The irony that Sony put up the biggest box office earner (and longest-running theatrical feature) in the post-pandemic era has not been lost on the industry, which is still trying to come to terms with balancing streaming with classic revenue models like theatrical releases. 

"Our theatrical model is driving our success and that is our core business," Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group President Josh Greenstein said to Deadline. "Our biggest movie ever had the longest window." 

While Sony is being applauded for scoring the massive theatrical hit of Spider-Man: No Way Home, it's also undeniable that other studios have played just as shrewd a game through streaming. Warner Bros. Discovery is getting to celebrate the new merger with a successful year, adding approximately 12.8M new subscribers to HBO and HBO Max. WB happened to be the only studio that chose to premiere a new big tentpole film on streaming as well as in theaters – and it's hard to deny the result. Then again, it's just as hard to weigh what Warner Bros. lost in theatrical profits against what was gained through streaming subscribers. 

For its part, Sony hasn't abandoned streaming altogether: in fact, the studio may be playing one of the shrewdest games around when it comes to streaming. instead of putting all its content behind its own streaming brand, Sony has been distributing its content to all of the other streaming platforms. Sony's 2022-2026 films are headed to Disney platforms like Disney+ and Hulu; it also has deals in place with Netflix. However, Sony uses the theatrical success of its films as the biggest bargaining leverage for its streaming deals:

"Streaming is additive to our business. It's not our core business. We participate in the streaming economy strategically with certain films," Greenstein adds. "We've licensed some films to streamers during Covid, but our long-term big business model will always be driven by theatrical."

Spider-Man: No Way Home is now available on streaming and home video.