The film earned $377,845,905 in the United States and Canada and $742,083,616 in other countries for a worldwide total of $1,119,929,521. Worldwide, it is the seventh highest-grossing film, the highest-grossing 2003 film and the highest-grossing installment in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It was the second film in history to earn over $1 billion.
In the US and Canada, it is the twenty-first highest-grossing film, the highest-grossing 2003 film, and the highest-grossing instalment in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. The film set an opening Wednesday record with $34.5 million. This record was first surpassed by Spider-Man 2 and ranks as the seventh largest Wednesday opening. The film opened a day earlier for a midnight showing and it accounted for about $8 million. This was nearly twice the first-day total of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (which earned $18.2 million on its opening day in 2001), and a significant increase over The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers as well (which earned $26.1 million on its debut in 2002). Part of the grosses came from the Trilogy Tuesday event, in which the Extended Editions of the first two films were played on 16 December before the first midnight screening. It went on to make an opening weekend of $72.6 million ($124.1 million with weekday previews). Its Friday-to-Sunday opening weekend was a record-high for December (first surpassed by I Am Legend). The film also set single-day records for Christmas Day and New Year's Day (both first surpassed by Meet the Fockers).
Outside the US and Canada, it is the seventh highest-grossing film, the highest-grossing 2003 film and the highest-grossing film of the trilogy. On its first day (Wednesday, 17 December 2003), the film earned $23.5 million from 19 countries and, during the 5-day weekend as a whole, it set an opening-weekend record outside the US and Canada with $125.9 million. It set opening-day records in 13 of them, including the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Holland, Spain, Greece, Switzerland, Scandinavia (as well as separately in Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark), Mexico, Chile and Puerto Rico. It set opening-weekend records in the United Kingdom ($26.5 million in five days), Germany, Spain, Sweden, Denmark and Switzerland. In New Zealand, where filming took place, the film set opening day, opening weekend, single-day, Friday gross, Saturday gross and Sunday gross records with $1.7 million in four days.
The substantial increase in initial box office totals caused optimistic studio executives to forecast that The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King would surpass The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers in total earnings. If this proved to be true, then this would be the first blockbuster movie trilogy for each successive film to earn more at the box office than its predecessor, when all three films were blockbuster successes. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King has helped The Lord of the Rings franchise to become the highest-grossing motion picture trilogy worldwide of all time with $2,917,506,956, beating other notable ones such as the Star Wars trilogies, and surviving from being out-grossed by subsequent trilogies like Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter, despite ticket price inflation.
These figures do not include income from DVD sales, TV rights, etc. It has been estimated that the gross income from non-box office sales and merchandise has been at least equal to the box office for all three films. If this is so, the total gross income for the trilogy would be in the region of $6 billion following an investment of $300 million ($426 million including marketing costs).
