Top Movies 2026

0:00 We rank Spider-Man: Brand New Day the number 1 movie of 2026. It has taken $2,523,147,515 worldwide on Box Office Mojo's 2026 chart (read Nov 11, 2026), about $719 million more than The Odyssey in second place, and it holds 90% from 439 critics and 97% from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes (read Nov 11, 2026). We think the sharper story is one line down: The Odyssey, Christopher Nolan's film of an ancient poem and no sequel to anything, made $1,804,356,298 and scored 94% from 515 critics, and we think it is the better film of the two. This list is 2026 so far, read on Nov 11, 2026, with seven weeks of releases still to come.

We think Spider-Man: Brand New Day will still be number 1 on Box Office Mojo's 2026 worldwide chart on Jan 31, 2027, because Avengers: Doomsday opens on Dec 18, 2026 and will have had only six weeks to close a gap of $2.52 billion.

Confidence: Likely. Check by: Jan 2027.

The top 25 movies of 2026

Best first: every film released in 2026 that has passed $200 million worldwide, in the order of its worldwide gross on Box Office Mojo, with its Rotten Tomatoes scores beside it, all read on Nov 11, 2026.

The Play column is each film's official trailer on its studio's or distributor's own channel. Pegasus 3, All Wishes Come True! and Scare Out play their distributor's international trailer, Obsession its distributor's teaser trailer, Kung Fu Soccer a distributor's teaser, and Scary Movie its final trailer, because its first trailer is age-restricted.

The five films past $1 billion

1. Spider-Man: Brand New Day opened on Jul 31, 2026 and is the year's number 1 by a wide margin. Its critics score of 90% and its audience score of 97% are both high, so nothing about its place is in dispute. We think it is a safe number 1: the film behind it would need another $719 million to catch it.

2. The Odyssey opened on Jul 17, 2026. Of the five films past $1 billion it has the highest critics score, 94% from 515 reviews, the most reviews of any film on this list. We think it is the film of the year, and that a gross of $1.80 billion for an adaptation of Homer says more about 2026 audiences than any sequel's total does.

3. Toy Story 5 opened on Jun 19, 2026 and scored 92% with critics and 94% with audiences. We think it is the least surprising entry in the top 5 and the most reliable: critics, audiences and the box office agree on it.

4. Michael opened on Apr 24, 2026. Critics gave it 38% from 311 reviews; audiences gave it 97%. That gap of 59 points is the widest on this list, and the film still passed $1 billion. We think the audience has the better argument about whether people enjoyed it, and the critics have the better argument about whether it is a good film.

5. The Super Mario Galaxy Movie opened on Apr 1, 2026 and passed $1 billion with a critics score of 42% from 226 reviews and an audience score of 87%. It is one of two game adaptations on this list, and the other, Resident Evil at rank 11, has the list's best widely reviewed critics score at 96%. The games themselves are ranked on Top Games 2026, where the measure is players, not tickets.

Still to come in 2026

The rule cannot see films that have not opened. These wide releases are on Box Office Mojo's US calendar for November and December 2026 (read Nov 11, 2026):

• The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping: Nov 20, 2026
• Hexed: Nov 25, 2026
• Focker-in-Law: Nov 25, 2026 (wide from Nov 27)
• Violent Night 2: Dec 4, 2026
• Behemoth!: Dec 4, 2026
• Avengers: Doomsday: Dec 18, 2026
• Dune: Part Three: Dec 18, 2026
• The Angry Birds Movie 3: Dec 23, 2026
• Jumanji: Open World: Dec 25, 2026
• Werwulf: Dec 25, 2026

We think at least three of these will enter the top 25 before the 2026 chart closes, and that Avengers: Doomsday and Dune: Part Three will both land in the top 10.

How we ranked

The rule: take Box Office Mojo's 2026 Worldwide Box Office chart as read on Nov 11, 2026, keep every film with a worldwide gross of $200 million or more, and list them in that order. That gives 25 films. A tie would break by the higher domestic gross; there are none.

Beside each gross is the film's Tomatometer (critics) and Popcornmeter (verified audience) score from its own Rotten Tomatoes page, read the same day. The scores do not move a film's rank. They are there so a reader can see at once where money and quality part ways. Where a film has fewer than 40 critic reviews we print the count beside the score, because 100% from 11 reviews is not the same claim as 96% from 304. Three films had too few verified ratings for an audience score.

What was left out: re-releases of older films (Box Office Mojo lists Avengers: Endgame's 2026 re-release separately, below $200 million), and films released in 2025 that kept earning in 2026, which sit on the 2025 chart.

Where another chart disagrees: The Numbers' list of 2026 releases by worldwide gross (read Nov 11, 2026) agrees with our first 13 places, then differs. It has lower totals for several films earned mostly outside North America, so it puts Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu 14th where we have it 16th, and it has Scare Out at $186,145,321, under our $200 million line. By its figures the 25th film would be GOAT, which Box Office Mojo has at $195,379,669.

What the rule cannot see:

• Films still in theaters. Totals for recent releases are still rising, and Rotten Tomatoes lists December re-releases for Spider-Man: Brand New Day, The Odyssey and Project Hail Mary.
• Films that open in November and December 2026, listed above.
• Streaming films. They sell no tickets. Netflix's own report on the first half of 2026 named War Machine its biggest title of the half with 147 million views (published Jul 16, 2026), and Swapped stands 8th on Netflix's Most Popular films list with 144,900,000 views in its first 91 days (read Nov 11, 2026). Neither can be placed on a list ranked by gross.
• Cost. A gross says nothing about profit; we did not use budget figures.
• Ticket prices and inflation, which a gross in dollars ignores.

What we think

We think gross alone flatters two films. Michael and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie are the only films in the top 10 that most critics did not recommend, at 38% and 42%. If you rank the 18 widely reviewed films here (100 reviews or more) by gross and again by Tomatometer and average the two places (equal scores placed by gross), The Odyssey comes first with 2.5, Spider-Man: Brand New Day second with 4, and Toy Story 5 and Project Hail Mary tie for third with 4.5. Michael and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie fall to a tie for tenth. We think that combined order is closer to what people will still be watching in ten years.

We think the most underrated result of the year is Obsession. It is the only original horror film in the top 10, it scored 93% with critics and 94% with audiences, and it sits one place above Resident Evil, a film with a famous name behind it. We also think Project Hail Mary at rank 7 is underrated by its place: at 95% and 95% it is the only film in the top 10 that both critics and audiences scored 95% or higher.

We think the English-language press underrates the seven films on this list that earned almost all their gross outside North America: Pegasus 3, Once Upon a Time in the Middle East, Kung Fu Soccer, All Wishes Come True!, Dear You, Blades of the Guardians and Scare Out. Together they are more than a quarter of the top 25, and none has more than 34 critic reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. We disagree with The Numbers on where they belong: its lower totals move most of them down and drop Scare Out off the list, and we think Box Office Mojo's higher figures are the more current reading. Our Predictions page tracks how the list ends the year.

Sources

• Box Office Mojo: 2026 Worldwide Box Office
• The Numbers: 2026 releases by worldwide box office
• Box Office Mojo: release calendar, November 2026
• Box Office Mojo: release calendar, December 2026
• Netflix: What We Watched, the first half of 2026
• Netflix Tudum: Most Popular films
• Rotten Tomatoes: Spider-Man: Brand New Day
• Rotten Tomatoes: The Odyssey
• Rotten Tomatoes: Toy Story 5
• Rotten Tomatoes: Michael
• Rotten Tomatoes: The Super Mario Galaxy Movie
• Rotten Tomatoes: The Devil Wears Prada 2
• Rotten Tomatoes: Project Hail Mary
• Rotten Tomatoes: Pegasus 3
• Rotten Tomatoes: Minions & Monsters
• Rotten Tomatoes: Obsession
• Rotten Tomatoes: Resident Evil
• Rotten Tomatoes: Backrooms
• Rotten Tomatoes: Hoppers
• Rotten Tomatoes: Once Upon a Time in the Middle East
• Rotten Tomatoes: Kung Fu Soccer
• Rotten Tomatoes: Star Wars: The Mandalorian and Grogu
• Rotten Tomatoes: Moana
• Rotten Tomatoes: All Wishes Come True!
• Rotten Tomatoes: Dear You
• Rotten Tomatoes: Disclosure Day
• Rotten Tomatoes: Wuthering Heights
• Rotten Tomatoes: Scary Movie
• Rotten Tomatoes: Blades of the Guardians
• Rotten Tomatoes: Scream 7
• Rotten Tomatoes: Scare Out