A $10 million horror hit and a $200 million game adaptation have turned Hollywood’s favorite indie into its most discussed takeover target.

A $10 million movie from a 20-year-old YouTuber has done what a sweep of Oscars never quite did for A24. It made the studio big. A24 has passed $500 million at the domestic box office in 2026 for the first time, Variety reports, and the run has revived Hollywood’s oldest parlor game about the company: whether its founders will finally sell.

Backrooms carries most of the weight. Kane Parsons’ horror film opened to $81 million domestically and $118 million worldwide, dwarfing the $25.5 million opening record A24 had set with Civil War. By late September it had crossed $400 million globally, including $197.5 million in North America, against a budget reported at $10 million. It is now the studio’s highest-grossing release ever.

Then came the bigger bets. A24 has wrapped Elden Ring, Alex Garland’s adaptation of the Bandai Namco video game, which Variety puts at a $200 million price tag. That is the kind of number the studio built its name avoiding.

The money questions follow naturally. A24’s last raise, a $75 million round from Thrive Capital in June 2024, valued the company at $3.5 billion, and three years before that it explored a sale at $2.5 billion to $3 billion. Variety reports that founders Daniel Katz and David Fenkel have since turned down several offers for equity investments and have flirted with buyers such as Apple and Sony, without a deal. One unnamed mogul told the trade, “If they’re ever going to monetise, this is the time to do it.”

The catch is the brand itself. A top executive warned Variety that in an acquisition, “brands don’t really survive,” and A24’s pull with young moviegoers rests on looking independent. A buyer would be paying a premium for the one quality that ownership could wear away.

Nothing is for sale yet. Watch whether A24 raises fresh money at a valuation that reflects the Backrooms year, and whether Elden Ring, slated for 2028, can justify a budget the company would have laughed at a few years ago.

Sources

• Variety – A24 on Top: With Bigger Budgets, Better Box Office and Splashy IP, Is it Finally Time to Sell? – https://variety.com/2026/film/news/a24-biggest-year-backrooms-elden-ring-1236938874/
• Hypebeast – A24’s ‘Backrooms’ Shatters Box Office Records to Become the Studio’s Biggest Domestic Release – https://hypebeast.com/2026/6/a24-backrooms-shatters-box-office-records-become-studios-biggest-domestic-release
• The Express Tribune – Backrooms storms past $400 million at the global box office – https://tribune.com.pk/story/2630396/backrooms-storms-past-400-million-at-the-global-box-office
• Wikipedia – A24 – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A24

Featured photo: Rafi Mohammed / Unsplash, Unsplash License.