The first few months of 2025 didn’t give the new and upcoming soundstages in Los Angeles much in the way of hope for a rebound in production.
The average occupancy rate for major soundstages in the city was 62 percent during the first six months of 2025, down one percent from the anemic 63 percent recorded in 2024, according to new data from local film office FilmLA released on Wednesday. Contrast that with the period between 2016 and 2022, when soundstages participating in the annual report survey reported an average occupancy rate of 90 percent or higher.
The report also tallied shoot days and number of projects filmed in 2024 for the first time. It found that the total number of projects shot increased five percent between 2023 and 2024 (from 1,225 to 1,287), though it’s important to note that 2023 was the year of the dual WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, which threw a major wrench into the production pipeline.
The total number of shoot days dropped eight percent in this period as well, from 8,671 days to 7,940 days. FilmLA says this decline is in large part due to a dwindling in scripted television, whose shoot days decreased 23 percent between 2023 and 2024.
FilmLA’s report gathered data from 17 studios participants whose spaces represent around 75 percent of the soundstage square footage in L.A. Major studios like Walt Disney Studios and Warner Bros. Studios Burbank took part alongside significant independent soundstage operators like Quixote and East End Studios.
The findings are emblematic of a precipitous drop in production following the so-called “Great Netflix Correction” of 2022 and the strikes of 2023 as the industry contracted and rapidly cut costs, leaving L.A.-based crew members and vendors in the lurch. And it represents a potential challenge for recently opened soundstages in the L.A. area like Cinespace Studios in Woodland Hills and East End Studios in the Arts District. More spaces are on their way, including the mammoth Echelon Studios development rising from a lot in Hollywood and Stocker Street Creative in Baldwin Hills.
California’s expansion last year of its film and television tax credit program and recent initiatives from L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and Councilmember Adrin Nazarian offer some hope that the bleeding can be staunched. But, still, the city has a lot of space to fill. With 8.3 million square feet of sound stages, the report calls L.A. the “world leader” in availability to film, compared with the U.K.’s 7.7 million square feet and Ontario’s 3.7 million square feet.
In other words, L.A. has all the infrastructure and is getting even more. Will the productions follow?
