James Cameron is now the only filmmaker with four billion dollar hits as Avatar Fire and Ash earns over $1 billion in 3 weeks

James Cameron’s sci-fi fantasy epic Avatar: Fire and Ash didn’t open as big as its prequel, Avatar: The Way of Water (2022), but it has grown slowly and surely at the global box office. Within just three weeks, it has now entered the $1 billion club, significantly propelled by its international earnings outside of North America and Canada.

Avatar: Fire and Ash, the third instalment in Cameron’s popular Avatar franchise, collected $40 million over its third weekend in North America. The earnings happened despite competition from much-talked-about films like Paul Feig’s thriller The Housemaid, starring Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried; Josh Safdie’s sports drama Marty Supreme, starring Timothee Chalamet; Tom Gormican’s action adventure comedy Anaconda, starring Paul Rudd and Jack Black; and the unstoppable holdover release, Disney’s animated sequel Zootopia 2. The third weekend collection has helped the total domestic box office collection of Avatar: Fire and Ash to go up to $306 million across North America and Canada.

Avatar: Fire and Ash has greatly benefited from its international box office collection. The film earned $777.1 million from cinemas outside of North America and Canada. Out of this, its biggest share comes from China ($138 million), where it’s the second biggest animation release of 2025 after Zootopia 2 ($601.40 million), also a Disney release.

After China, Avatar: Fire and Ash amassed the most in France ($81 million), Germany ($64.1 million), South Korea ($44.1 million), the UK ($42.5 million), Mexico ($31.8 million), Australia ($25.8 million), Spain ($25.2 million), Italy ($24.2 million), India ($23.6 million), Indonesia ($16.6 million), and Brazil ($14.9 million).

Add the domestic and international box office collections of Avatar: Fire and Ash, and the film has surpassed the coveted $1 billion mark at the global box office. It’s now the 39th biggest global hit of all time, after beating Christopher Nolan’s 2012 superhero film The Dark Knight Rises ($1.081 billion) with its $1.087 billion worldwide haul.

With Avatar: Fire and Ash entering the $1 billion club, it’s given its director James Cameron the unique position to have scored four billion dollar hits globally. Out of the other three, two are the previous instalments of his Avatar franchise — Avatar (2009) and Avatar: The Way of Water. In fact, those two films scored above $2 billion each globally, making the cumulative worldwide box office collection of the franchise to be $6.35 billion, and counting.

Before the Avatar franchise, Cameron scored his first billion dollar hit with his 1997 epic romance Titanic, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, who is also a part of his Avatar franchise. Titanic, the fourth highest global grosser of all time, also stands at $2.25 billion. The first and third positions are held by Avatar ($2.9 billion) and Avatar: The Way of Water ($2.34 billion), with Russo Brothers’ 2019 Marvel movie Avengers: Endgame ($2.79 billion) sitting in the middle.

Hence, Avatar: Fire and Ash has tremendous expectations to at least come as close to the other three of Cameron’s highest grossers, which count among the top 5 highest grossers of all time worldwide. The fifth position is secured by another 2025 animated release, China’s action adventure fantasy Ne Zha 2. At $2.24 billion, it’s the only non-American film in the top 5 highest global grossers of all time.

Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in Titanic.

At the Indian box office, Avatar: Fire and Ash has performed tremendously well, earning over Rs 177 crore within three weeks. This collection is achieved despite major competition from domestic releases like Aditya Dhar’s blockbuster period spy thriller Dhurandhar, Sameer Vidhwans’ romantic comedy Tu Meri Main Tera Main Tera Tu Meri, and Sriram Raghavan’s period war drama Ikkis.

Avatar: Fire and Ash released in India across six languages. The native English version has secured the biggest chunk of the film’s domestic box office collection at Rs 78 crore, followed by the dubbed Hindi (Rs 60 crore), Tamil (Rs 26 crore), Telugu (Rs 15 crore), Malayalam (Rs 2.03 crore), and Kannada (Rs 48 lakh) versions.

Avatar: Fire and Ash has far surpassed the lifetime box office collection of the first Avatar at the India box office, which stands at Rs 28.92 crore. But it’s less than half of the lifetime domestic box office earnings of Avatar: The Way of Water, which amassed Rs 391.40 crore at the India box office.

But Avatar: Fire and Ash has still earned more than major Bollywood releases of 2025, including Jolly LLB 3 (Rs 117.60 crore), Tere Ishk Mein (Rs 119.50 crore), Thamma (Rs 157.05 crore), and Sitaare Zameen Par (Rs 166.58 crore). Its next target is Raid 2 (Rs 179.30 crore), which it should be able to surpass on its third Wednesday (day 20) at the India box office, given the current trajectory.

Avatar: Fire and Ash has also become the highest grossing Hollywood film of 2025 at the Indian box office. It’s beaten the likes of Tom Cruise-starrer Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (Rs 106.90 crore), Brad Pitt-starrer F1 (Rs 102.82 crore), and Scarlett Johansson-starrer Jurassic World Rebirth (Rs 100.56 crore).