The Top 10 Highest Grossing Animated Films of All Time

So this is a work in progress. I'll start with this list and keep building off of it and making it more interesting.

Second, I'm making this list because while the information is out there, you cannot find it in a list like this. You can find the top grossing domestic films. But this is the only list that lists the top grossing international sales... both domestic and overseas.

But why should the domestic sales matter? The point of making films (by the investors and studios that back them; not necessarily the point of the artistic film-makers) is to make money and gain profit on the initial investment. So what should matter is the gross income and not the domestic income. For example, taking domestic comparisons, Shrek 1 made $267 million and Up made $293 million, which isn't a huge difference. However, worldwide, Shrek made $484 million and Up made $731 million, which is a much bigger difference. As another example, Kung-Fu Panda is 15th in Domestic but 6th in world-wide.

That said, the cost of the film is also significant, because that helps determine the net profit (so I include the cost, but I don't bother calculating the net profit, since theater costs also aren't calculated). For example, you could have a movie like Jimmy Neutron be a huge hit because it made $80 million domestic and only cost $30 million. Compare that to Beowulf, which made $82 million domestic, but it cost $150 million to make.

TOP 10 HIGHEST GROSSING ANIMATED FILMS

Note: Listed in order of world-wide grosses.

1. Shrek 2
STUDIO: DreamWorks | WORLD-WIDE: $919.8 mil | DOMESTIC: $441.2 mil | YEAR: 2004
COST: $150 mil

2. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
STUDIO: Fox | WORLD-WIDE: $886.7 mil | DOMESTIC: $196.6 mil | YEAR: 2009
COST: $90 mil

3. Finding Nemo
STUDIO: Disney/Pixar | WORLD-WIDE: $867.9 mil | DOMESTIC: $339.7 mil | YEAR: 2003
COST: $94 mil

4. Shrek the Third
STUDIO: DreamWorks | WORLD-WIDE: $799.0 mil | DOMESTIC: $322.7 mil | YEAR: 2007
COST: $160 mil

5. Lion King
STUDIO: Disney | WORLD-WIDE: $783.8 mil | DOMESTIC: $328.5 mil | YEAR: 1994
COST: $45 mil

6. Up
STUDIO: Disney/Pixar | WORLD-WIDE: $731.3 mil | DOMESTIC: $293.0 mil | YEAR: 2009
COST: $175 mil

7. Ice Age: The Meltdown
STUDIO: Fox | WORLD-WIDE: $655.4 mil | DOMESTIC: $195.3 mil | YEAR: 2006
COST: $90 mil

8. Kung Fu Panda
STUDIO: DreamWorks | WORLD-WIDE: $631.7 mil | DOMESTIC: $215.4 mil | YEAR: 2008
COST: $130 mil

9. The Incredibles
STUDIO: Disney/Pixar | WORLD-WIDE: $631.4 mil | DOMESTIC: $261.4 mil | YEAR: 2004
COST: $92 mil

10. Ratatouille
STUDIO: Disney/Pixar | WORLD-WIDE: $623.7 mil | DOMESTIC: $206.4 mil | YEAR: 2007
COST: $150 mil

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To be fair to the old timers and to give you a bonus list, here's a list of the top animated films with adjusted income. So that means we can truly compare to ticket sales and how much those movies would have made today. However, the system isn't a one-for-one comparison because (1) films would sell differently at different times, (2) the world-wide market isn't taken into account, mostly because the older films didn't initially release internationally, and (3) the older films were also re-released a few times, and those sales are added in to the total. In other words, even though this is a fair comparison for some reasons, it is unfair in the sense that we have no clue how well the older films would perform if they were released today (probably not as well).

TOP 10 HIGHEST GROSSING ANIMATED FILMS - Domestic and Adjusted

Note: We're including the adjusted foreign income where available.

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $866.6 mil | YEAR: 1937
ADJUSTED COST: $7.02 mil

2. 101 Dalmatians
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $794.3 mil | YEAR: 1961
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $389.2 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $1,183.5 mil / $1.183 bil
COST: Unknown

3. Fantasia
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $660.2 mil | YEAR: 1941
COST: Unknown

4. The Lion King
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $614.0 mil | YEAR: 1994
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $851 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $1,465 mil / $1.465 bil
ADJUSTED COST: $88.3 mil

5. The Jungle Book
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $585.8 mil | YEAR: 1967
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $264.4 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $850.2 mil
COST: Unknown

6. Sleeping Beauty
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $577.8 mil | YEAR: 1959
COST: Unknown

7. Shrek 2
STUDIO: DreamWorks | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $564.8 mil | YEAR: 2004
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $612.7 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $1,177.5 mil / $1.178 bil
AJUSTED COST: $192 mil

8. Pinocchio
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $535.9 mil | YEAR: 1940
COST: Unknown

9. Bambi
STUDIO: Disney | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $506.5 mil | YEAR: 1942
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $818.7 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $1,325.2 mil / $1.325 bil
COST: Unknown

10. Finding Nemo
STUDIO: Disney/Pixar | DOMESTIC, ADJUSTED: $447.9 mil | YEAR: 2003
FOREIGN, ADJUSTED: $696.4 mil | WORLD-WIDE, ADJUSTED: $1,144.3 mil / $1.144 bil
ADJUSTED COST: $123.94 mil

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Enjoy!

- TAE