Avengers: Endgame” has reclaimed the title of the highest-grossing film of all time, surpassing James Cameron’s “Avatar” by a razor-thin margin of just $2 million following the success of its “Encore” re-release. The Marvel Studios blockbuster now sits at approximately $2.9255 billion worldwide, edging past Avatar’s $2.9237 billion according to Variety . The gap between the two cinematic titans is so narrow—roughly the cost of a modest penthouse in Los Angeles—that the record could flip again at any moment.
How Marvel Pulled It Off
The victory was engineered through a strategic theatrical re-release titled “Avengers: Endgame: Encore,” which hit theaters on September 25, 2026, ahead of December’s “Avengers: Doomsday.” The Encore edition included four minutes of new footage across four scenes, serving as teasers for the upcoming film, plus an introduction from Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Evans. The re-release opened to a staggering $86 million worldwide in its debut weekend—the third-best domestic debut ever for a re-release, behind only the 1997 “Star Wars” special edition and the 2011 3D “Lion King” . Over its theatrical run, Encore added roughly $126 million to Endgame’s lifetime gross, including $36.2 million domestically and $89.8 million internationally
A Record That Keeps Trading Hands
This is not the first time these two films have swapped the crown. Avatar held the record for a decade after its 2009 release before Endgame dethroned it in July 2019 . Then in 2021, Avatar reclaimed the top spot through a re-release in China ahead of “The Way of Water” . Now, five years later, the pendulum has swung back to Marvel. The larger context makes the achievement even more striking: Between 2020 and this summer, only two Marvel films crossed $1 billion—“Spider-Man: No Way Home” and “Deadpool & Wolverine”—while last year’s “Captain America: Brave New World,” “Thunderbolts*,” and “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” grossed roughly $1.3 billion combined, less than half of what Endgame made on its own.
The Road to $3 Billion
While Endgame has reclaimed the throne, it remains just shy of the mythical $3 billion milestone. Analyst David A. Gross noted that re-releases rarely earn more than $10 million, making Endgame’s $126 million haul an exceptional outlier that underscores Hollywood’s enduring reliance on intellectual property . The film’s domestic total stands at approximately $894.6 million, with $2.03 billion from international markets . With “Avengers: Doomsday” arriving December 18 and “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” already sitting third on the all-time list at $2.497 billion, the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s cumulative gross has now surpassed $35 billion across 38 films . Whether Endgame can hold the crown—or whether Cameron has another re-release up his sleeve—remains the billion-dollar question.