Activision made more money in one weekend than eight countries did in a year

Call of Duty Black Ops 3
Call of Duty Black Ops 3

In three short days, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 made $550 million, or about £361 million, AU$780 million. That's more than any film opening, book launch or CD in 2015, combined.

The game, which launched on Friday, November 6, is the 12th game in the main series, and the 12th Call of Duty game released in as many years.

To put the number in perspective, that's more than Jurassic World's $208 million and Marvel's The Avenger's $207 million opening weekends combined. Those films were the two biggest opening launches of all-time, and these were completely shattered by all accounts.

Another way to put it is Call of Duty: Black Ops III made more money than Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which sold a comparatively meager 8.3 million book copies on its first day, and NSYNC's No Strings Attached album, which only sold 2.3 million copies on its first week.

It's more money than eight small countries make in a year, and is encroaching on nine.

The craziest part of this story, though, is these numbers aren't unprecedented. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 made around $500 million in its first 24 hours, and Activision reports that the first Black Ops game has now made more than $1 billion.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 is available on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PS3, PS4 and PC.

Nick Pino

Nick Pino is Managing Editor, TV and AV for TechRadar's sister site, Tom's Guide. Previously, he was the Senior Editor of Home Entertainment at TechRadar, covering TVs, headphones, speakers, video games, VR and streaming devices. He's also written for GamesRadar+, Official Xbox Magazine, PC Gamer and other outlets over the last decade, and he has a degree in computer science he's not using if anyone wants it.