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• box office
  box office

  noun

  the office of a theater, stadium, or the like, at which tickets are sold.
• box-office
  box-office

  adjective

  of or relating to the box office or to the business and commercial aspects of the theater.

box office

¹ American  

noun

• box offices
  plural

1. the office of a theater, stadium, or the like, at which tickets are sold.

2. Theater.

   1. receipts from a play or other entertainment.

   2. entertainment popular enough to attract paying audiences and make a profit.

      This show will be good box office.

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box-office ² American  

[boks-aw-fis, -of-is] / ˈbɒksˌɔ fɪs, -ˌɒf ɪs /

adjective

1. of or relating to the box office or to the business and commercial aspects of the theater.

   a box-office window; box-office receipts; a box-office attraction.

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box office British  

noun

1. an office at a theatre, cinema, etc, where tickets are sold

2. the receipts from a play, film, etc

3. 1. the public appeal of an actor or production

      the musical was bad box office

   2. ( as modifier )

      a box-office success

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box office Idioms  

1. The office where seats for a play, concert, or other form of entertainment may be purchased, as in Tickets are available at the box office . It is so called because originally (17th century) it was the place for hiring a box, a special compartment of theater seats set aside for ladies. [Second half of 1700s]

2. The financial receipts from a performance; also, a show's relative success in attracting a paying audience. For example, You may not consider it great art, but this play is good box office . [c. 1900]

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• box offices
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of box office¹

First recorded in 1780–90

Origin of box-office²

First recorded in 1805–15; adj. use of box office

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

box office box-office

Netflix publicly reported box office results for the first time in its history this weekend as it released its queer drama “La Bola Negra” in U.S. theaters.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 18, 2026

Meanwhile, the new sequel to the Oscar-winning hit The Social Network also struggled at the box office on its opening weekend.

From BBC ● Oct. 12, 2026

North American ticket sales for “Other Mommy,” the new horror movie from Universal Pictures, leading the domestic box office despite poor reviews by both theatergoers and critics.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2026

His movies "aren't really too worried about their box office total; they're worried about having an artistic endeavor behind" them.

From Barron's ● Oct. 12, 2026

James Ford steps out of the box office thinking Booth is pulling some crazy stunt to get attention.

From "Lincoln's Last Days: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever" by Bill O'Reilly

Take Anne Hathaway, fresh off a string of box-office smashes in “The Odyssey,” “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” “The End of Oak Street” and “Mother Mary.”

From Salon ● Oct. 9, 2026

Either way, it promises to be box-office stuff.

From BBC ● Sep. 7, 2026

But “with one or two box-office successes I was completely restored in the Hollywood community,” he wrote.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 2, 2026

But after an indie distributor rescued it, the Looney Tunes flick made a triumphant debut in theaters, earning the No. 2 box-office slot this weekend.

From Slate ● Sep. 1, 2026

This contemporary lithograph lampoons the panicked gentry who fled the city - and thus turned Handel’s new oratorio, Theodora, into a box-office flop.

From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall

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