The horror origin story A Quiet Place: Day One is set to hit theaters soon, and based on its budget and what it needs to earn at the box office, it could easily be a very profitable movie. A Quiet Place: Day One serves as a prequel and origin story to John Krasinski’s first two sci-fi horror films. As a spinoff, A Quiet Place: Day One has a new cast of characters, a new setting in New York City, and a new story. Those new elements, combined with the franchise’s aliens that find their human prey through sound, mean the prequel could be a major success.

Already, A Quiet Place: Day One is performing admirably. Those who have already seen it have given A Quiet Place: Day One positive reactions, and it could be just as successful as the first two films. There’s even a chance that A Quiet Place: Day One could beat its predecessors in a few key areas, such as the opening scene of A Quiet Place Part II. It seems poised to be a good, well-received movie, but what does A Quiet Place: Day One need to earn at the box office to earn back its budget and make a profit?

A Quiet Place: Day One’s Budget Could Be $100 Million

Alex Wolff, one of the stars of A Quiet Place: Day One, recently mentioned that the film had a budget of about $100 million (via DiscussingFilm). That seems like a feasible budget for A Quiet Place: Day One, even though this is far from an official budget and there’s a real possibility that Wolff was estimating or rounding the number up. It’s especially possible when compared to the budgets of other installments in the franchise. A Quiet Place had a budget of just $17 million, and A Quiet Place Part II had a larger budget of about $60 million (via Variety).

There are a few reasons A Quiet Place: Day One may have a larger budget than its predecessors. The original A Quiet Place was a surprising hit at the box office, and it made over $340 million at the box office (via Box Office Mojo). That massive success likely increased A Quiet Place Part II‘s budget, and the sequel’s subsequent success probably did the same for the most recent installment. Additionally, much of A Quiet Place: Day One was filmed in New York City, and filming in the city is significantly more expensive than the first two films’ more rural settings.

A Quiet Place: Day One’s Box Office Needs To Make At Least $200 Million

Since its budget is likely set at $100 million, A Quiet Place: Day One likely needs to earn at least $200 million at the box office to break even. The standard calculation for a new movie’s required box office earning is the point a movie breaks even, due to costs and expenses not covered by the production’s budget. To earn a profit, A Quiet Place: Day One will need to make about $250 million at the box office, again according to that same industry standard estimation. Generally, a film needs to earn over 2.5x its budget before it makes a profit.

While $250 million seems to be the goalpost for A Quiet Place: Day One, that doesn’t necessarily mean it will have failed if it doesn’t surpass that mark. In the age of streaming, the old calculation is less reliable than it once was. Many films continue to make money after they leave theaters by enticing subscribers to a certain platform, in this case Paramount+. Those earnings are harder to quantify, though, so the box office metric is still useful. In any case, if A Quiet Place: Day One can earn $250 million, it will be an undeniably successful movie.

Source: DiscussingFilm, Variety, Box Office Mojo