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box office

box office

60 2.5
Money that comes from selling tickets for a film or show
  • noun
  • /ˈbɑks ˈɔfɪs/
translation icon : taquilla
  • Despite receiving generally negative reviews from critics, it was a box office success after earning $212.9 million, against its $80 million budget.
  • box office revenue
  • box office success

Motion pictures that were huge hits at the box office worldwide.

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Examples

Synonyms

revenue
vsbox office
  • Specialized
352 3.4

Money a business gets from sales before paying costs

refers only to income from tickets for shows and events
gate
vsbox office
  • Jargon
26 5.7

The total money from ticket sales at an event

applies to ticket income for films performances and similar events
sales
vsbox office
1.0

The money a company gets from selling goods or services

is limited to ticket income from performances and films

How Successful

blockbuster
81 2.6
box office
60 2.5
hit
465 1.3
flop
44 4.3

Surface Forms

box office singular
box offices plural

Morphology

box + office

The MWE meaning 'amount of money earned from ticket sales' is a metonymic extension (from the place where tickets are sold to the takings) and is not directly or compositionally derived from 'box' (a seating area) + 'office' (a room for work). A B1 learner who knows the constituent words is unlikely to predict this financial sense without prior exposure, so the expression functions idiomatically in this use.

Etymology

Box office also came to mean the money in that box, because counting the cash from ticket sales showed how well a show did. So it now means 'the money made from ticket sales'.