Saudi Cinema Has Generated Nearly USD 1 Billion in Revenue Since 2018

It has been only six years since Saudi Arabia’s first cinemas opened in April 2018, and in that time the big screen sector has accumulated just shy of USD 1 billion in revenue, according to new data from the Saudi government.

The USD 986 million total (SAR 3.7 billion) was accumulated over 1,971 film screenings, including 45 local productions as the local film sector gears up to fill the silver screen with the Kingdom’s own features. Nearly half of those films were produced in 2023 alone, signalling a huge uptick in the rate of production.

Over the past six years, Saudi cinemas have sold a total of over 61 million tickets, a sign of people’s rapid adoption of new cultural activities in general. The Kingdom’s VIsion 2030 project is aiming to enable the entertainment sector as a whole to contribute 3% of the nation’s GDP (USD 23 billion) by 2030, and create more than 100,000 jobs.

Over the past six years, the cinema sector’s infrastructure grew from zero open cinemas at the start of 2018, to 66 cinemas now open across 22 cities, boasting 618 screens and 63,373 seats.