In 2022, cinemas experienced a notable rise, with admissions up 45 percent from the previous year, reaching about 61.2 million viewers. Box office receipts climbed to 379 million euros. Provisional data from ComScore, reported on December 29, show a 49 percent increase versus 2021.
Despite this growth, the average annual box office and attendance for 2022 remained well below the 2015–2019 period. Data from FECE, the Federation of Spanish Cinemas, shared with Europa Press, indicate that current figures are 39 percent lower than before the pandemic, underscoring a still-recovering market.
The year’s best premiere was Avatar: The Way of Water, which opened on December 16 and generated 21.8 million euros in its initial period. The strongest week of the year occurred in December, with total viewership of 2.4 million from Friday the 23rd to Thursday the 29th. On December 28, cinema attendance hit a post-pandemic record, with more than 620,000 spectators on a single day.
Within the country, the provinces drawing the most cinema-goers were Madrid with 20.6 percent, followed by Barcelona at 14.2 percent, Valencia at 6.5 percent, Alicante at 4.1 percent, Seville at 3.8 percent, Malaga at 3.8 percent, Murcia at 3.3 percent, Cadiz at 2.9 percent, the Balearic Islands at 2.4 percent, and Vizcaya at 2.4 percent.
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Avatar and Santiago Segura, box office leaders
In Spanish cinema, Santiago Segura emerged as a top director, with Padre no hay más que uno 30 released on July 14, earning 15,606,103 euros and attracting 2,706,823 viewers. Tadeo Jones 3. The Emerald Table, released on August 26, tallied 11,798,257 euros and 2,031,242 viewers. God’s Crooked Lines, released on October 6, grossed 5,724,928 euros and drew 907,563 viewers.
Overall, Avatar: The Way of Water topped the box office for the year, followed by Minions: The Origin of Gru with 20,775,435 euros and Jurassic World: Dominion with 18,157,971 euros. For the first time since 2019, all ten of the year’s most-watched films surpassed the 10 million euro mark in box office, as FECE highlighted. In addition to the titles already mentioned, the list includes Padre no hay más que uno 3 with 15,606,103 euros; Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness with 13,130,862 euros; Uncharted with 12,230,193 euros; Tadeo Jones 3: The Emerald Table with 11,798,257 euros; Thor: Love and Thunder with 11,607,167 euros; Batman with 10,831,396 euros; and Top Gun: Maverick with 10,581,530 euros.
The action genre dominated the scene that year, followed by animation and comedy in popularity and box office take.
Spanish cinema returns to a leaner year but stays resilient
Across the year 2022, the Spanish film industry ended with a total revenue of 82,022,550 euros and 13,694,836 viewers, showing a substantial increase over 2021 figures of 7,107,930 viewers. However, even with the growth, 2022 remains far from the record levels seen in 2019, when box office exceeded 94 million euros with more than 16 million viewers, or in 2018 when revenues reached 103,799,709 euros with 17,622,470 viewers.