The North American box office is showing signs of recovery following nearly three years of plummeting ticket sales. According to a recent report from Statista, box office sales reached 825 million tickets, surpassing 2022 box office returns by more than 13 million tickets. 

The pandemic, which shut down theaters across the globe in 2019, caused theater ticket sales to fall sharply. By 2021, sales began to recover, reaching 492 million tickets, well below sales prior to the pandemic which had reached 1.2 billion tickets. 

Despite being able to return to theaters, many moviegoers have been reluctant to go back to their previous habits. This has had a major financial impact on the North American box office, which includes Canada and the U.S. Theaters, which have watched revenue steadily fall since the beginning of the pandemic, reaching $7.4 billion in 2022.

In Canada, these figures were even worse, where theaters saw their profits fall to $345 million CAD or just over $250 million USD, one-third of the value reported two years earlier.

Theaters have also seen their profits fall due to the increased prevalence of online streaming services, as well as the recent recession. This has prompted many experts to try and find ways to tap into new and emerging trends. 

People aged 12 to 17 attended an average of 2.5 feature films at theaters in 2021, five times more than theatergoers 60 and older. 

A recent survey by Statista found that GenZ were more likely to attend films at theaters where there were a wide range of options. GenZ were also motivated by the audio and film quality of the production, followed by the price of admission. 

As of March 2023, AMC Theatres was the leading cinema circuit in the U.S. and Canada, with 7.71 thousand screens spread across both countries. Regal and Cinemark followed with around 6.47 thousand and 4.39 thousand movie theater screens, respectively, according to Statista. In 2022, AMC revenue fell to $4 billion in 2022. In the second quarter of 2023, AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc. reported global revenue of $1.35 billion, up 15.6 percent from the same time in 2022. 

Meanwhile, Cineplex, a leading entertainment and media company, reported its third-highest August box office revenues of all time, generating $68 million, which represents 120 percent of box office revenues during the same month in 2019.

"We continue to see improved overall performance from the film industry and impressive results from Cineplex's diversification strategy. For July and August, our combined box office and concession revenues were 121 percent of 2019 levels, attendance was 99 percent of 2019 levels, and more importantly, adjusted EBITDA was over 160 per cent of 2019 levels," said Ellis Jacob, president and CEO, Cineplex. "These financial results represent our strongest combined July and August ever."