Budget to Box Office Analysis of the 13 Star Trek Feature Films

[Noname Given]

I found this analysis of the Trek Feature film franchise interesting - it's all about the numbers and light of being subjective of the subject::

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The one BIG bomb: ST: NEM

 

[Set Harth]

I just looked at the numbers and all I can say is holy shit

 

[JamesRye]

I have not watched the video, but was interested in the numbers. My conclusion is that the TOS movies had an average multiplier (of budget) of 4.82x what they cost. Nice.
The TNG movies were much less successful, with a multiplier of 2.415, which is to say that they were break even at the box office.
The Nu-Trek movies, surprisingly, only have a multiplier of 2.31, which is to say that they were break even as well.

Now, this of course excludes such things as VHS, DVD, BLU-RAY and 4K sales - to name just a few mediums on which the movies have been released. To this day, ST09 remains one of the best selling blu-rays of all time. TWOK was a smash on VHS, shifting well over 80,000 units on its initial release. And of course, streaming rights - even for Beyond, were $40 million!

But, we can see the immense popularity and huge success of TOS in the multiplier figure.

There's also the popular myth, frequently spouted by the Inglorious Treksperts, that Trek movies were mid-budget films, with mid budget returns. TMP was the 4th highest grossing movie of 1979. TWOK was the 8th highest grossing movie of 1982. Star Trek 3 was 9th, even VI was 15th highest grossing in 1991. Hardly mid-budget returns!

If we look at the highest grossing movie of 1989, we find Batman, with a $35million budget! Just $2 million more that V's.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture
Budget: $46 million
Gross: $139 million
3.02 x multiplier

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
Budget: $11.2 million
Gross: $97 million
8.66x multiplier

Star Trek III: The Search For Spock
Budget: $16 million
Gross: $87 million
5.4x multiplier

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Budget: $21 million
Gross: $133 million
6.33x multiplier

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
Budget: $33 million
Gross: $63 million
1.9x multiplier

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country
Budget: $27 million
Gross: $96.9 million
3.6x multiplier

Star Trek Generations
Budget: $35 million
Gross: $118 million
3.37x multiplier

Star Trek: First Contact
Budget: $45 million
Gross: $146 million
3.24x multiplier

Star Trek: Insurrection
Budget: $58 million
Gross: $112.6 million
1.93x multiplier

Star Trek: Nemesis
Budget: $60 million
Gross: $67.3 million
1.12x multiplier

Star Trek
Budget: $150 million
Gross: $385.7 million
2.57x multiplier

Star Trek Into Darkness
Budget: $185 million
Gross: $467.4 million
2.52x multiplier

Star Trek Beyond
Budget: $185 million
Gross: $343.5 million
1.85x multiplier

 

[Maurice]

The video is basing this on figures from The Numbers, and in the description, he admits not having the prints & marketing budgets, so it's really impossible to know how profitable any of those films are, especially where international sales are concerned, where the distribution costs vary by territory.

I dunno where The Numbers gets that $35 mil figure for the TMP budget. That seems low.

 

[JamesRye]

The video is basing this on figures from The Numbers, and in the description, he admits not having the prints & marketing budgets, so it's really impossible to know how profitable any of those films are, especially where international sales are concerned, where the distribution costs vary by territory.

I dunno where The Numbers gets that $35 mil figure for the TMP budget. That seems low.

Probably Box Office Mojo, who list that figure of $35 million.

My figures came from Google AI and wikipedia. The actual budget is somewhere between $35-44 million depending if you count money spent from the aborted Phase2 and Planet of the Titans.

The multiplier figure shown above is useful for understanding the profitability - but the truth is that none of these films will loose money in the long term - even the dreadful Star Trek: Nemesis and Star Trek Beyond. But the ROI for both these movies ended the respective runs.

In the case of the TNG movies, you can see that multiplier figure just dropping for each subsequent movie after Generations. Meantime, the budget rose for each movie after Generations, whilst the ROI decreased. I guess the studio saw the same pattern emerging for the Kelvin movies.

Here are the budgets for the TNG movies:

• Star Trek: Generations (1994): $35 million
• Star Trek: First Contact (1996): $45–46 million
• Star Trek: Insurrection (1998): $58–70 million
• Star Trek: Nemesis (2002): $60-70 million

 

[Maurice]

TMP's budget also includes money spent on Roddenberry's 1975 script, and money paid to other writers approached to come up with concepts, etc.

 

[CoveTom]

I have always seen TMP's budget reported as $47 million, making it the most expensive movie ever made to that point. However, that budget not only folded in earlier script development, as @Maurice mentioned, but all of the development costs from the aborted Phase II television series, making it not anything near an actual reflection of what TMP cost to make.

 

[Maurice]

The aborted series was Star Trek II, and that was mentioned already. But all movie budgets reflect all the work attempted to bring it to the screen. TMP's budget was not unique in that regard.

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

TMP was the 4th highest grossing movie of 1979

It came out December of that year, so if that is true, then it actually made a lot of money quickly.

I'm a bit confused by the multiplier analysis. How is a number of 2 a break-even film? Isn't al multiplier of 1 "break-even?" Would not "2" that not mean it make back all the money it cost to make, then that much over again?

So for example, if a movie took 10 million to make, then had a multiplier of 2, would not that mean it made 20 million, leaving the company with 10 million profit?

 

[Maurice]

I'm a bit confused by the multiplier analysis. How is a number of 2 a break-even film? Isn't al multiplier of 1 "break-even?" Would not "2" that not mean it make back all the money it cost to make, then that much over again?

So for example, if a movie took 10 million to make, then had a multiplier of 2, would not that mean it made 20 million, leaving the company with 10 million profit?

No, because theaters keep a cut, the studio needs to recoup its marketing budget on top of the film budget for what the real cost to the studio is—which is often paid for with loans that have interest charges—and there may be profit participation (points) for stakeholders that have to be paid out. That's why it's considered normal that a movie isn't technically profitable until it's made 2 to 3 times its budget.

 

[JamesRye]

It came out December of that year, so if that is true, then it actually made a lot of money quickly.

Avatar Fire and Ash came out in December of 2025 - it will not be counted as one of the highest grossing movies of 2026 - rather, it will be one of the highest grossing movies of 2025.

Sometime, it'd be fun to report on how popular each movie was in terms of where it finished in the box office chart by year. As I say, there's a popular myth that the Trek movies were mid-budget fims with mid-budget returns, but I think that is only really true for some of the movies.

 

[JamesRye]

Where did the Trek movies rank per year at US domestic box office:

TMP: 4th
TWOK: 8th
TSFS: 8th
TVH: 7th in 1986 and 25th in 1987. If we add them up, it'd have been 4th in 1986
STV: 21st
STVI: 21st
ST:GEN: 17th
STFC: 14th
STINS: 40th
STNEM: 74th

ST09: 7th
STID: 10th
STBEY: 16th

Just look at the hit that Trek took in 1989, where it plummets out of the top 10, the franchise won't return to the top 10 until 2009. None of the TNG movies trouble the top 10 and the disaster that was Nemesis was the final nail in the coffin. The performance of Insurrection after the hit that was First Contact also stands out.

Those first 4 TOS movies were huge.

Surprised to see Beyond in the top 20.

Obviously this is all a bit unfair as competition varies year on year. Notably, ST09 was released against heavy hitters, as was TWOK and STV though.

 

[Set Harth]

STNEM: 74th

ouch

 

[Deleted member 104212]

Fun breakdown — thanks for pulling the numbers together. One small stats nuance that’s worth flagging, though.

When you average multipliers directly, each film gets equal weight, even though the budgets vary a lot. Since multipliers are ratios, the more standard way to compare eras is to weight by budget — i.e., total gross ÷ total budget for each era.

If you do it that way, the picture shifts a bit:

• TOS films: ~3.99× (rather than 4.82×)
• TNG films: ~2.24×
• Kelvin films: ~2.30×

The overall trend is still there, but Wrath of Khan’s unusually low budget pulls the unweighted TOS average up more than it probably should.

Also worth noting on the “break-even” point: a ~2.3–2.4× box office multiple likely meant different things in different eras. Marketing and distribution costs were much lower relative to budget in the TOS era than they were post-2000, so later films generally needed higher multiples to end up in the same place financially.

None of this negates the popularity of the earlier films — it just tightens the comparison a bit.

 

[CoveTom]

Something else to factor in to all of this... the first four TOS movies were clearly the most successful period of Trek films. They were also the only era of Trek films to exist at a time when there was that little Trek content available. All you had were the original 79 episodes, which had been re-run and re-run and re-run and a new film every couple of years. That's it.

TFF had many issues of its own, of course, but it was also the first Trek film released after TNG debuted. And since then, there has been more and more and more Trek available for folks to choose from. The films simply are not events like they were back when the first four films were released.

 

[JamesRye]

I may be mistaken in the post on 'where did the Trek movies rank per year at US domestic box office'.

I got the numbers from Box Office Mojo. But multiple other sources quote STVI as being at number 15 at US domestic vs 21st.

It'd also be cool to look at foreign vs domestic splits. Trek suddenly became real popular here in the UK and also in Germany during the late 90s.

I remember the huge hype for Generations. And all the Trek merchandise, toys etc.. Great times.

 

[JamesRye]

Fun breakdown — thanks for pulling the numbers together. One small stats nuance that’s worth flagging, though.

When you average multipliers directly, each film gets equal weight, even though the budgets vary a lot. Since multipliers are ratios, the more standard way to compare eras is to weight by budget — i.e., total gross ÷ total budget for each era.

If you do it that way, the picture shifts a bit:

• TOS films: ~3.99× (rather than 4.82×)
• TNG films: ~2.24×
• Kelvin films: ~2.30×

The overall trend is still there, but Wrath of Khan’s unusually low budget pulls the unweighted TOS average up more than it probably should.

Also worth noting on the “break-even” point: a ~2.3–2.4× box office multiple likely meant different things in different eras. Marketing and distribution costs were much lower relative to budget in the TOS era than they were post-2000, so later films generally needed higher multiples to end up in the same place financially.

None of this negates the popularity of the earlier films — it just tightens the comparison a bit.

I agree, that's a better way to look at it.

I think the major factor is also the VHS, DVD and Blu-Ray / Digital download sales figures. ST09 is still one of the highest selling blu-rays of all time - before the physical media collapse. And all the TOS and TNG films did great back when video rental / sales were a thing.

 

[mb22]

From what I recall, TWOK was the first major film to be released on video a few months after the film's release at a relatively low price of $39.95 for public purchasing (not cheap in 1982 dollars but a lot less than the $80-$100 prices that video store owners had to pay before they rented them out).