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November 2026

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Sinema

How many people go to the cinema in Türkiye?

According to TÜİK, 27.7 million people went to cinemas in 2025, less than half the 2019 figure. The reasons for the drop and the picture worldwide.

WyvOne Editör ·

Türkiye'de sinema salonuna kaç kişi gidiyor?

In 2019, 56 million 479 thousand people went to cinemas in Türkiye. In 2025 that number was 27 million 657 thousand. In other words, audiences fell by more than half in six years. The figures come from TÜİK's (the Turkish Statistical Institute) Cinema and Performing Arts Statistics bulletin, published in June 2026.

So the honest answer to "are cinemas still indispensable?" is "not as much as before." But the picture is not one-directional either. Let's look at the data we have today, 6 November 2026.

Representative image.

What do the numbers say?

According to TÜİK, cinema attendance in 2025 fell 15 percent from the previous year. Attendance at domestic films fell 18.3 percent to 15 million 96 thousand, and attendance at foreign films fell 10.7 percent to 12 million 561 thousand. Calculated from these figures, domestic films' share of total attendance comes to about 54.6 percent. In 2019 that share was 57.2 percent. Although the drop was sharper for domestic films, they still fill most of the seats.

During the year 771 films were screened, 417 of which were new releases (159 domestic, 258 foreign). The country has 2 thousand 161 screens and 253 thousand 364 seats.

According to Hürriyet Daily News, looking at the first half of 2025 (6 August 2025), ticket sales fell to 15.44 million, the lowest in ten years, and were down 28.2 percent from the same period last year. The same report says box office revenue rose about 7 percent. If revenue rises while audiences shrink, there is an explanation: ticket prices. The report also notes that inflation-adjusted ticket prices are at a record level.

Two cautions are needed in reading the numbers. First, the number of tickets sold is not the same as the number of people who went to the cinema; one person can buy more than one ticket, so the real number of viewers may be smaller than the ticket count. Second, the 2019 and 2025 figures come from two separate TÜİK bulletins. I have not compared their calculation methods, so the near-halving between them should be read as a rough comparison.

Why aren't we going?

In the same report, cinema writers and a producer give several reasons. Critic Ali Ulvi Uyanık says viewing habits shifted to digital platforms after the pandemic. Producer Muzaffer Yıldırım argues that the real problem is content, and that audiences will not return unless must-see films with big names come out. Critic Uğur Vardan points to economic pressure: cinema has become an expensive outing for a family, and platforms have reduced the need to go to a theatre.

These are the commentators' views, not measured causes. But all three arrive at the same place: price, habit and the film itself.

Among the films that sold the most tickets in the first half of 2025 were productions aimed at children: Rafadan Tayfa: Kapadokya, Minecraft and Sonic. The report notes that the top of the list was occupied by children's films rather than mainstream films for adults.

The picture worldwide

Worldwide, the picture stands in a different place. According to year-end data published by Gower Street Analytics on 6 January 2026, the global box office reached about $33.55 billion in 2025. That is above 2024: up 6 percent at current exchange rates and 12 percent at historical rates. Still, it is well below the record $42.3 billion of 2019, and about 16 percent behind the 2017-2019 average. So the global box office is recovering but has not returned to pre-pandemic levels. According to the same article, December 2025, with $3.5 billion in revenue, was the highest-grossing December since 2019. The year closed just 1 percent behind 2023 and counts as the second-highest year since 2019.

Part of this recovery comes from ticket prices. An article relaying industry analyses says that price, more than audience numbers, played a role in the rise in revenue, and that large-format screens in particular carried it. The same pattern is seen in Türkiye: revenue holds while the number of people falls.

Is the cinema indispensable?

Not according to the data. The number of people going to cinemas has fallen by more than half since 2019, and the decline continued in the last year. But 27 million people still bought tickets, and domestic films still draw more than half the audience. The cinema has become less an indispensable place than a selective one: people go after weighing the price and the film.

Sources

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