Box Office: ‘Lion King’ Reigns with Record $185M Debut

The Disney juggernaut has scored another recording-breaking box office opening for July with The Lion King roaring into theaters.

Disney’s The Lion King earned the biggest debut of any July film to date with a $185 million take at the box office, according to Box Office Mojo. Lion King toppled Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 and its $169.1 million opening in 2011. The opening is the second biggest opening of the year behind Avengers, and the seventh largest of all time.

Lion King could easily earn $590 million over its first box office take, according to estimates.

Disney also scored with the Avengers: Endgame finally toppling Avatar as the top grossing film in history. The Mouse House used the occasion of a Marvel panel at San Diego’s famed Comic Con to announce that Endgame would surpass Avatar as the biggest film ever.

In second place, Sony’s Spider-Man: Far from Home maintained its top-five status earning another $21 million. That earns the latest Spidy flick a $320 million box office take.

Disney and Pixar’s Toy Story 4 also kept its top-five showing, in third place with an estimated $14.6 million earning. Toy Story has brought in more than $375 million since its opening.

Paramount’s Crawl scared up another $6 million to add to its $24 million take in its first two weeks at theaters.

Finally, in fifth place, Universal’s Beatles-inspired musical, Yesterday, took in $5 million to bring its domestic total to $57.5 million.

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.