We all know that DC Comics had an ABSOLUTELY incredibly year in 2025 but how incredible? Could they have some close to or even surpassed Marvel in key metrics? Just to answer our own headline, we’ll most likely never know, but there are some clues.
As we’ve noted here many times, overall comics sales figures have been hard to come by post Covid. While ICV2 provides charts based on ComicHub’s POS data from a selection of comics shops, it’s a small sample, and we’ve detected more and more public and private grumbling about the accuracy of those numbers.
The nearly complete data black out has to have been particularly vexing to DC Comics, at least from a PR standpoint. They’ve had hit after hit in ’25, including the entire Absolute line, but also with Matt Fraction’s Batman relaunch, the DC K.0. series, and the entire All In line refresh that seems to have lifted other titles. Marvel has been the #1 comics publisher longer than many reading this have been alive, but DC made huge gains in 2025. If there was ever a time that sales numbers could have been shouted from the rooftops, it’s now. But there are just no rooftops left to shout from.
However, as 2025 drew to a close, DC found a way to share some numbers via a story by Borys Kit at The Hollywood Reporter: Batman Absolute Universe Comics Power DC’s Super Year, which includes some big numbers:
According to figures shared with The Hollywood Reporter, the Absolute Universe line of monthly comics has sold over 8.2 million units in total, not accounting for December sales. Absolute Batman, the flagship title, makes up around 35 percent, close to 3 million, of that total. The first issue of Absolute Batman continues to sell well and is now in its 10th printing, while the latest issue, Absolute Batman No. 15, has orders of over 300,000.
When is the last time an issue #15 sold more than 300,000 copies? I think you would have to go back a very long time for that one. (Maybe John Jackosn Miller will pipe up in the comments?)
The rest of the piece is an exercise in triumphalism, but I would say a well deserved one. DC’s senior VP and GM Anne DePies, and president, publisher and CCO Jim Lee, editor in chief Marie Javins and Absolute mastermind Scott Snyder did everything right in ’25, helping readers and comics shops get excited about their line again, and they deserve a place to crow a bit. Some more tidbits from shadowy “insiders”:
- Five of the six Absolute titles “outpaced and outperformed” 2011’s New 52 and 2016’s Rebirth.
- Absolute Martian Manhunter, the most obscure Absolute launch, sold more than six figures.
- Batman #1 from Fraction and Jiménez has sold more than 500,000 copies, and sales on subsequent issuess continue rising.
- DC’s top five books for the year included Batman #1, Batman #158 (Lee on art), Absolute Batman #15, Batman Deadpool and DC K.O. #1.
- In a tidbit that will resonate with those who followed my summer expedition to look at supermarket checkout racks, DC is partnering with supermarket chains “to have certain comics, usually first issues, available for sale, bringing titles to locations that haven’t been seen in decades.”
Newsstand sales? In this economy???
This also ties in with the success of checkout aisle special issues given over to Superman and Batman which I’ve heard anecdotally sold amazingly well.
Longtime DC Kremlinologists will find much to chuckle about in the THR piece, including some digs at previous DC relaunches, but also, Lee and DePies getting a chance to boast a bit.
DePies: “The tightness of the line gives retailers and fans something to wrap their heads around. It’s not so overwhelming that we are changing everything at once. That made a big difference. We knew it was going to do well, but we didn’t know it would do this well.”
Lee: “To have something bringing in lapsed fans and new fans, you can’t see that on a spreadsheet and predict. It’s lighting in a bottle.”
Do we have any more anecdata about all of this? ICv2’s most recent data shows DC with 9 of the top 10 comics periodicals for November, and gaining in market share – up to a 29.5% market share for Q3 2025, but still trailing Marvel’s 36.6% share. However, that’s up a 20.1% market share for DC in Q3 2024, so major gains.
And it wasn’t just reading material where DC had a big year. How DC Finally Beat Marvel at the Box Office, proclaimed Umberto Gonzalez at The Wrap, in a headline sure to bring a smile to David Zazlav’s eye. The story is paywalled, but more insiders gave more info:
“Superman” generated more than $100 million in profit for Warner Bros. through theatrical revenue, streaming and merchandise, according to an insider. But the bigger accomplishment may be what Safran and Gunn have done behind the scenes: uniting DC’s historically fractured publishing, film, gaming and consumer products divisions for the first time.“James Gunn and Safran went into this knowing they can’t retread the same ground over and over again,” Fandango’s movie analytics director Shawn Robbins told TheWrap of the revamp. “But they also knew that they had to connect with today’s younger audience and get younger generations and even some of the older generation off the couch and out to the theater to see the 10th Superman movie. That was a big challenge for them.”
The ad for the Supergirl trade paperback at the end of the Supergirl teaser trailer is shining proof of this, and another point of fantastic visibility for the comics line.
I think what DC Comics did in 2025 was a huge lift for the industry, especially given the brutal cuts and corporate uncertainty the company has had to deal with for years. I wish we had the sales charts that really showed that in absolute numbers. DePies, Lee, Javins and Snyder crafted a line that was a critical success that wasn’t just about blind bags (although yes they did do blind bags), that drew new readers into stores, and in general provided the leadership that the industry really needed in the Year of Diamond’s Collapse.
Will the battle for sales chart supremacy heat up even more in ’26? Will we see more insiders leaking numbers to THR or elsewhere? Stay tuned.
