HBO anticipated that this new series would be a massive hit, and it’s already making waves – breaking a significant viewership record even before its December premiere.
Adriano Goldman, the director of photography for the upcoming HBO Max Harry Potter TV series, recently discussed the show on André Pilli’s podcast. He shared details about the large-scale production and revealed that Harry Potter has a bigger budget than any other streaming series to date, including The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.
Harry Potter’s Scale Is Massive
I’m so excited to hear HBO is going to bring all seven books to life, with each one getting its own season! It’s amazing to think they started filming in the summer of 2025 at Leavesden Studios – that’s where they made all the Harry Potter movies, and Warner Bros. still owns the studio! Although it’s the same location, they didn’t reuse any of the old sets; the team had to build everything from scratch for this new series, which is incredible!
Adriano Goldman, a Brazilian director and cinematographer, is known for working on high-budget television projects. He previously filmed Disney+’s Andor and Netflix’s The Crown, both of which are incredibly costly to produce. Each episode of Andor‘s two seasons cost over $20 million, while The Crown averaged more than $10 million per episode.
Goldman acknowledged that the Harry Potter series is probably very expensive to produce. Currently, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power on Prime Video has the highest reported cost, at $58 million for its first season and $57.2 million for the second (these figures aren’t adjusted for inflation). While Max hasn’t revealed how much Harry Potter is costing, the filmmaker believes it will also be a significant investment.
Goldman suggested the project likely has the largest construction budget of any streaming service, possibly of all time.
The project is massive and beautifully done. I think people are going to be really impressed, and it seems like everyone is already thrilled with it.
The Harry Potter Films Were Huge Blockbusters
It’s no surprise Warner Bros. heavily invested in Harry Potter; the eight movies were already quite expensive to make. In total, Warner Bros. spent over $1.15 billion producing the film series, with Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) having the lowest budget at $100 million.
The initial investment in the series proved worthwhile, as it earned over seven times its production cost. In total, the Harry Potter franchise has generated more than $7.7 billion globally, with the first film, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (2001), and the final installment, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 (2011), both exceeding $1 billion in revenue.
, with Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon, His Dark Materials, and The Last of Us.
The upcoming Harry Potter series premieres on HBO Max on Dec. 25.
2026-07-19 19:11