Hi Nolly fam, let’s sit down and have a real talk about the first quarter of 2026 in Nollywood. We watched a lot of films, tracked how they performed at the box office, and reviewed them here at NollyCritic. The big picture? There are signs of life and growth in the cinemas, but the quality across the board remains uneven — sometimes promising, often frustrating, and occasionally rewarding.
First, the encouraging part on the commercial side. According to data from the Nigerian box office released on April 5, 2026 and reported by Nairametrics, Nigeria’s cinema industry recorded its strongest first quarter in six years, with 752,136 ticket admissions, up from roughly 661,720 in Q1 2025 (a 13.7% increase). Nollywood films drove the majority of that turnout, accounting for over 553,000 admissions, or about 73.5% of total tickets sold. That local dominance is clear and consistent.
But let’s not get carried away by headline naira figures. Ticket prices have been rising steadily, so a film grossing hundreds of millions today doesn’t automatically mean far more people watched it than before. The real health check is admissions: how many actual humans bought tickets and showed up. On that metric, we’re seeing modest but positive growth. People are slowly rebuilding the habit of going to the cinema, helped by strategic releases especially around Valentine’s.
The Commercial Standouts
A small group of films carried the quarter, as is typical in Nollywood theatricals.
Love and New Notes (produced by Timini Egbuson and directed by Kayode Kasum) was the undisputed champion. It opened with a massive ₦106.5 million Valentine’s weekend; the biggest non-December opening for a Nollywood film in recent memory, including a single-day high and went on to gross around ₦328–362 million cumulatively, with some reports pushing toward ₦380 million. It even held strong against Hollywood titles like Scream 7 in later weekends. The film is one of our highest scores this quarter. It delivered accessible romance with decent production values and emotional beats that mostly landed. This one proves that when timing, star power, and relatable storytelling align, audiences will turn up in solid numbers.
Onobiren (produced by Laju Iren) was another strong performer. Released in early March, it ran for about seven weeks and closed with a reported ₦138 million gross. It topped the box office in some weekends and showed respectable staying power. It earned a slightly above average rating of 2.75/5.
The film carries clear ambition in its focus on a woman’s journey, resilience, purpose, and the support system among women, with grounding in its South South cultural roots. There were moments of emotional weight and visual competence, but it didn’t always push beyond familiar dramatic territory for us. Its commercial legs still show that thoughtful, female-driven stories can find an audience when marketed right.
Mother’s Love (starring and directed by Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde) opened with decent figures reportedly crossing ₦25 million in its first weekend and eventually passed the ₦100 million mark. However, we were less impressed, critical as it earned a 1.75/5 review score. The star power brought initial curiosity, but the execution felt underwhelming, lacking the fresh emotional depth or tight storytelling the premise seemed to promise.
Other titles like Aba Blues (2.5/5, with a respectable opening around ₦19.9 million) showed stronger craft in patches. Many of the remaining titles among the roughly 20 Nollywood films that hit cinemas this quarter had shorter runs and quieter footprints, splitting limited screens in a competitive market.
Our Ratings and What They Reveal
We reviewed or watched a broad selection this quarter and rated everything out of 5. The average score came in at approximately 2.55/5. Squarely in mixed-to-mediocre territory.
Here’s a quick rundown:
The brighter spots (3.0 and above):
- Love and New Notes (3.5) — A rare solid overlap between commercial success and critical reception.
- To Adaego With Love (3.35) — One of the more emotionally satisfying entries.
- The Covenant – series (3.0), Evi (3.1), and Queens Don’t Crawl (3.0).
The middle pack (2.25–2.85): Films like Son of the Soil (2.75), Onobiren (2.75), Echoes Before The Wedding (2.5), Aba Blues (2.5), The Other Side of the Bridge (2.5), Alive Till Dawn (2.35), Everything is New Again (2.25), Supernowa (2.85), and the series Anikulapo: The Ghoul Awakens (2.4) lived here. They often had solid ideas or committed performances but felt uneven in pacing, emotional depth, or execution. The Anikulapo continuation carried franchise weight but landed more as an unnecessary addition than a bold elevation.
The lower end (below 2.0):
- Mother’s Love (1.75)
- Headless (1.75)
- The Creek (1.6) — Felt “caught between urgency and incompletion.”
- The Return of Arinzo (1.5) — High hype met with an underwhelming payoff.
- Trade by Bata (1.35) — Our lowest this quarter and the year so far.
A Note on the Lower Ratings
Mother’s Love (1.75) was the first big disappointment of the quarter for us. It felt like the most discouraging watch at the time: familiar tropes, limited emotional depth, and a story that didn’t rise above what we’ve seen before.
As more films followed, the disappointments continued. Headless (1.75), The Creek (1.6), The Return of Arinzo (1.5), and Trade by Bata (1.35) all landed in similar territory. Because the low points kept coming, our ratings settled into this range naturally.
Mother’s Love could easily have been our lowest, but we held it at 1.75 to leave room on the scale as the quarter unfolded. In the end, Trade by Bata took the bottom spot.
This cluster at the lower end says as much about the overall consistency of the slate as it does about any single film.
What’s Really Going On?
Looking across the slate, clear patterns emerge:
- Commercial success doesn’t always line up with critical strength. Love and New Notes was a happy exception, but star-driven or hyped projects sometimes coasted on anticipation.
- Thematic ambition is growing (identity, womanhood, class, resilience in titles like Onobiren, Evi, Trade by Bata, and Colours of Fire), yet the filmmaking tools like screenplay focus, directorial confidence in balancing tones, and consistent payoff, often fall short.
- The “winners-take-most” dynamic persists. A few titles dominate screens and attention while many others struggle.
- Even franchise entries like Anikulapo: The Ghoul Awakens (2.4) felt safe rather than elevated.
Rising ticket prices add another layer of pressure. Growth in admissions is real and welcome, but it remains fragile. If audiences pay more only to walk away thinking “it was okay, not great,” building long-term cinema habits becomes tougher.
Final Thoughts
Q1 2026 leaves us with cautious optimism. The numbers (per April 2026 box office reports) show theatrical demand is recovering and Nollywood continues to own the majority of the local market. Films like Love and New Notes and Onobiren prove there’s genuine audience appetite when the package mostly clicks. Yet our average rating of ~2.55/5, alongside recurring notes on underdeveloped execution, suggests the industry is still figuring out how to consistently convert ambition into fully satisfying cinema.
The challenge, and opportunity, for the rest of 2026 is straightforward: tighten storytelling, trust the emotional core, sharpen craft (especially pacing, comedy timing, and logical consistency), and move beyond “good enough.” When ideas, performances, and execution line up, Nollywood can move audiences and make money. We saw flashes of that this quarter. Now it’s about making those flashes the norm.
We’ll keep watching closely, scoring honestly, and reporting back.
What about you? Which Q1 film surprised you the most positively or otherwise? Did any lower-rated movie still entertain you, or did a higher-rated one miss the mark? Share your thoughts in the comments.
