Weekend projections: Five Nights at Freddy’s headed for third-best horror opening

October 29, 2023

Five Nights at Freddy’s

Five Nights at Freddy’s will smash through expectations and post an opening weekend of $78 million, according to Universal’s Sunday-morning projection. If that number holds, it’ll be the third-best opening weekend for a horror movie, with only It and It: Chapter Two ahead of it.

Here’s how the domestic numbers look as of Sunday morning (click on the image for the full chart of films reporting so far)…



Five Nights is doing marginally better than our Friday-morning prediction. The audience response has been excellent, with the film earning an A- CinemaScore, and word of mouth seems to be helping it maintain a good pace through the weekend. Universal pegs its audience as 58% male, and 80% under the age of 25, with Hispanic audiences making up a significant 40% of the crowd.

Along with earning the third-best opening for a horror movie, Universal are claiming Freddy’s will have the best opening for Halloween weekend, ahead of Puss in Boots, which debuted with $34.1 million back in 2011.

The studio also notes that the film will have the biggest opening ever for a film on Peacock, and describes it as the most “subscription driving content” since its release on October 26. We’ve done quite a bit of research on how simultaneous releases on streaming platforms affect the performance of films at the box office. Generally, a day-and-date release on Disney+ and (HBO) Max has decreased box office for films, while a similar release on Peacock and Paramount+ hasn’t. That’s probably down to the number of subscribers on each platform. In this case, it’s safe to say the early streaming release hasn’t harmed the film’s finances.

Globally, the film will earn $130.6 million this weekend, the best horror debut of 2023, and Blumhouse’s best global opening of all time, beating Halloween’s $91.8 million. Its biggest territories on opening weekend are Mexico, with $10.81 million; the United Kingdom, with $6.25 million; Brazil, with $3.942 million; and Australia, with $3.792 million.

The other standout performer this weekend is After Death, from Angel Studios. The faith-based documentary will top $5 million, which is a bit behind our model’s prediction, but an excellent result nonetheless.

- Studio weekend projections
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- All-time top-grossing movies in North America
- All-time top-grossing movies worldwide

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Bruce Nash,