What are the top 10 most viewed trailers online in the first 24 hours of release?

Trailers play an important role in the content discovery experience for consumers. Two to three minutes of impeccably edited footage are an evergreen advertisement for film and TV content and steadily build anticipation and online chatter as part of a pre-release marketing strategy.

The release of a new film or TV trailer has become an event in itself, spawning reactions on video sharing websites and social media platforms as fans clamour for tasty titbits about their next film or TV obsession.

In the week when the tidal wave of pink-saturated hype surrounding Barbie finally crested, we look at the 10 most viewed film trailers in the first 24 hours of release online (stats taken from imdb.com) and the platforms where you can currently watch these films or TV shows in the UK and Ireland. Are there any surprises in the list below or perhaps a film or TV show you’re surprised is missing from the rundown?

1.Spider-Man: No Way Home (teaser trailer)

A huge amount of anticipation surrounded the third instalment (excluding Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame) of the web-slinger’s adventures in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

In what was Marvel’s first foray into the world of the multiverse, rumours were rife about the potential appearance of past Spidermen Toby Maguire and Andrew Garfield. Would they share the screen with the current incarnation of Peter Parker played by Tom Holland?

Clever editing and digital wizardry concealed a definitive answer but it didn’t stop fans devouring the teaser in record numbers.

Views: 355.5 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

2.Avengers: Endgame (teaser trailer)

After the cliffhanger of Avengers: Infinity War, Marvel fans were eagerly awaiting the first sneak peek of the concluding chapter of the Avengers saga that would see the original dream team from 2012 reunite in full for the first time since the devastation of Avengers: Age of Ultron.

The prospect of Captain America and Iron Man healing emotional wounds after their bitter feud in Captain America: Civil War was simply irresistible.

Views: 289 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

3.Avengers: Endgame (official trailer)

Appetites were well and truly whetted by the Avengers: Endgame teaser trailer and almost as many people tuned in for a first glimpse of a full promo of the Avengers attempting to reverse the destruction wrought by supervillain Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War.

Confirmation of a spectacular final showdown bringing together characters from across the entire MCU guaranteed a massive response.

Views: 268 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

4.The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (teaser trailer)

The highest placed on-demand TV series for trailer success capitalised on the enduring love for Peter Jackson’s trilogy of films, which made history when The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King won 11 Academy Awards and became the first fantasy film to collect Best Picture.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is set thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, exploring cataclysmic events in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth such as the emergence of Sauron.

Five seasons are planned and the next salvo of episodes is expected in 2024 so don’t be surprised if Galadriel and magical kin challenge Marvel’s supremacy at the top of this list in years to come.

Views: 257 million

VOD platforms: Prime Video

5.Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (teaser trailer)

The seventh and most recent instalment of the Transformers series stepped back in time to the 1990s to introduce a new faction of shape-shifting robots, the Maximals led by Optimus Primal, to support the Autobots in the defence of Earth from planet-devouring menace Unicron.

A five-year gap between the last Transformers instalment, Bumblebee, and this most recent outing was clearly too much for fans as the teaser trailer snuck past Marvel superheroes and gatecrashed the top five.

Views: 238 million

VOD platforms: Paramount+ (expected later this year)

6.Avengers: Infinity War (teaser trailer)

Audiences got their first tantalising glimpse of Thanos in a post-credits sequence of the 2012 film Avengers Assemble but it wasn’t until Avengers: Infinity War that fans really understood that the purple-skinned menace intended to wipe out half of the living organisms in the universe with a snap of his Infinity Gloved-fingers.

With the promise of destruction on a grand scale, it’s little wonder that the teaser for one of the centrepieces of phase three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe generated such feverish excitement on the first day of release.

Views: 230 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

7.The Lion King (2019) (teaser trailer)

Building on the success of live-action remakes of animated classics Dumbo, Beauty and the Beast and The Jungle Book, expectation was dizzyingly high for the photorealistic computer-animated remake of the 1994 coming of age story, The Lion King.

A stellar voice cast including Donald Glover, Seth Rogen, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Alfre Woodard and – say her name – Beyoncé Knowles-Carter – sent the internet into meltdown when a teaser trailer finally invited us into the circle of life.

Views: 224 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

8.Thor: Love and Thunder (teaser trailer)

While Captain America and Iron Man completed their individual story arcs in Avengers: Endgame, Chris Hemsworth’s hammer-wielding god concluded the showdown with Thanos at a dramatic crossroads.

Would he lose that generous belly, gained after the Snap, and continue to drift aimlessly through the galaxy in the company of Peter Quill, Drax and co?

Reuniting Thor with Ragnarok director Taiki Waititi and love interest Jane (Natalie Portman) created thunderclaps of excitement that propelled the teaser trailer into the top 10.

Views: 209 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

9.It (teaser trailer)

In 1990, Tim Curry sent chills down the spine as Pennywise the clown in a two-part TV miniseries of Stephen King’s award-winning novel set in Maine, about a group of children who are stalked by a malevolent force and finally face their fears in emotionally scarred adulthood.

An unsettling teaser trailer for director Andy Muschietti’s 2017 supernatural horror sparked global coulrophobia by luring six-year-old Georgie Denbrough to his grim demise in a storm drain during a torrential downpour.

“We all float down here” promises a child’s voice as red balloons hang ominously in the air and Bill Skarsgård exposes razor-sharp teeth of his demonic Pennywise.

Views: 197 million

VOD platforms: Not currently included with any VOD subscriptions

10.Avengers: Infinity War (official trailer)

Seeing Iron Man line up alongside Doctor Strange and Star-Lord while Rocket Raccoon and Groot tagged teamed Thor to decide the fate of the universe was catnip for millions of Marvel fans.

The action-packed film trailer for directors Anthony and Joe Russo’s box office behemoth posed many questions, not least: had the Avengers finally met their match in Thanos?

Views: 179 million

VOD platforms: Disney+

PA TV Metadata is excited to enrich the content discovery experience for consumers with trailers for films and TV shows on linear and VOD platforms as a standalone data set or as part of a customisable premium package of the Where to Watch service.

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