How Taiwan has ridden a box office rollercoaster through 2026

On the surface, the past year has seemed like the best of times for Taiwanese cinema.

Box office revenue for local films has reached $43.1m (NT$1.41bn) in 2026, surpassing 2025’s total of $28.9m (NT$940m) – with two months of the year still to go – according to Taiwan Film & Audiovisual Institute.

The year began strongly with Gavin Lin’s Sunshine Women’s Choir dominating the box office for two months after opening on December 31. It grossed $23.8m (NT$775m) to become the highest-grossing local film of all-time, smashing the record that has been held by Cape No. 7 since 2008.

Another local hit quickly followed. Opening on New Year’s Day, Hero! Hito! – a film about Taiwan’s baseball team rising from underdog to champions – earned $2.93m (NT$95.4m) to become Taiwan’s second highest-grossing documentary.

Steve Wang, co-founder of Hero! Hito! distributor Activator, attributes much of its success to the historical significance of the victory and the support of production partners ADATA Technology and the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL).

“[ADATA and CPBL’s] enthusiasm, connections, and resources are unmatched by most film distributors”, says Wang. “The large-scale press conferences and premieres, a generous advertising budget, and a plethora of merchandise allowed us to fully utilise our resources.”

Flops and bounceback

However, the Lunar New Year holiday, usually the most lucrative period for film releases, was a mixed bag. While Joseph Hsu’s comedy drama Double Happiness was a modest hit with $2.63m (NT$85.7m), Giddens Ko’s big-budget fantasy Kung Fu flopped with only $1.44m (NT$47m).

Local films then saw an extended lull until late August, when horror sequel The Rope Curse 4: Kuntilanak and comedy Pa Pa Go finally brought audiences back. The two films grossed $2.49m (NT$81.3m) and $2.78m (NT$90.8m) to become the year’s fifth and third top-grossing local films, respectively.

Jeff Tsou, the producer of the Rope Curse franchise, says a loyal fanbase and staking its claim as the first Taiwanese horror film to shoot overseas were key to the success of the feature, which ranks as the highest-grossing instalment of the series.

The Rope Curse and Tag-Along franchises, both based on local horror folktales, led the way for a new horror boom in Taiwan. Nine out of the 10 top-grossing Taiwanese horror films were produced in the past decade. The Rope Curse series alone makes up for three of these.

However, Tsou says that Taiwan cannot follow Hollywood’s low-budget horror model as local features command higher budgets.

“There was a time when there were a lot of low-budget horror films because Taiwan’s film industry tends to chase whatever is in fashion, but a lot of them were very bad,” he explains. “Audiences have become smarter, so Taiwanese horror films now require bigger stars and bigger budgets.”

‘Choir’ remains high note

Out of 42 local releases this year, the five top-grossing titles already make up 80.5% of local films’ total revenue, and no local film has crossed the NT$100m ($3.07m) mark since Sunshine Women’s Choir. The rising tide that many hoped that film would bring to the local industry failed to materialise.

“Compared to 20 years ago, the distribution environment for Taiwanese films is already much better,” says Activator’s Wang. “Of course, there is still lots of room for growth and improvement in local films’ market share. The key prerequisite to improve is that films must also plan with the market in mind rather than being purely creative.”

Meanwhile, Hollywood continues to be most popular with local audiences, making up for eight out of the 10 highest-grossing titles of 2026 to date and led by Spider-Man: Brand New Day and Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey.

Japanese animation also continues to perform well, with Detective Conan: Fallen Angel Of The Highway and Chiikawa The Movie: The Secret Of The Mermaid Island landing in ninth and 11^th place with $6.62m (NT$216m) and $5.28m (NT$172m), respectively.

H.W. Yao, deputy general manager for movie distribution and marketing at Medialink, Chiikawa’s distributor in Taiwan, tells Screen that the rapid rise in popularity of anime on streaming platforms post-pandemic created an exponential increase in the theatrical audience. Demand and revenue has also been boosted by releasing anime titles on premium-format screens such as 4DX and ScreenX.

Cinemagoing in Taiwan is also back on an upswing. This year’s total box office revenue already stands at 89% of 2025’s total and highly anticipated titles such as Godzilla Minus Zero, Avengers: Doomsday and Dune: Part Three indicate that total box office will rise for a second consecutive year.

However, the outlook for local titles remains uncertain.“No one expected Sunshine Women’s Choir to be a hit,” adds Rope Curse producer Tsou.

“Even when word-of-mouth started to build, no one thought it would break records. It’s true that Hollywood has dominated in the last few years, and there are very few local genre films on the horizon. But I’m still hopeful that there will be a dark horse.” 

Taiwan box office 2026 (as of Oct 31)

*Released Dec 31, 2025