If you only read the press releases, New Jersey already has a thousand acres of soundstages. If you actually have a production to schedule, the picture is different, and the difference matters. Here is the honest split, re-checked July 31, 2026.

Bookable today: a real working ecosystem. The State’s official directory lists close to 70 soundstages in current operation, most of them small to mid-size: insert stages, cyc and green-screen studios, virtual-production volumes, and purpose-built soundproofed stages such as 10 Basin Studios in Kearny at 36,000 square feet, alongside facilities like Palisade Stages, Supor Studios and Parlay Studios.

Not bookable yet, whatever the renderings suggest: the headline campuses. All three are construction sites. Here is what each one actually is, with the numbers from official announcements and the developers rather than from coverage:

Netflix Studios Fort Monmouth — Eatontown and Oceanport

Twelve soundstages planned across roughly 500,000 square feet, plus production support and community amenities, on the former Fort Monmouth site. Crews installed the final structural beam on Stages 3 and 4 on June 23, 2026, a topping-off that completes the skeleton of the first buildings, not the stages themselves. Netflix has said it remains on track to complete Phase 1A in summer 2027.

Oceanport is Film Ready certified and has its own municipal process. That does not make the campus bookable. See our Fort Monmouth and Monmouth County guide for the parcel-by-parcel jurisdiction.

Lionsgate Newark — 801 Frelinghuysen Avenue, South Ward

A $125 million, 270,000 square foot facility on a 12-acre plot, with six sound stages between 10,000 and 30,000 square feet with broadcasting capability, about 52,000 square feet of office and support space, and a mill shop and equipment stage. Designed by Gensler and developed by Matrix Development with Lionsgate, Great Point Studios, NJPAC and the Newark Housing Authority. Construction commenced December 11, 2025, targeting 2027.

1888 Studios — Bayonne peninsula

A 58-acre site beside the Bayonne Bridge, planned at over 1 million square feet with 23 sound stages and more than 350,000 square feet of production support, which would make it the largest production facility in the Northeast. Also designed by Gensler, developed by Togus Urban Renewal. In October 2025 Paramount Skydance signed a minimum 10-year, 285,000 square foot lease. Groundbreaking was December 16, 2025.

Why this matters beyond scheduling. The incentive math is tied to these buildings. A designated Studio Partner is calculated at 40%, and a Film-Lease Production Company between 35% and 40%. Those designations attach to campuses that are mostly not open yet, and as of July 31, 2026 all three Studio Partner designations are already spoken for. We covered what that means in the designation-cap note.

There is one detail worth knowing if you are considering a facility that has not opened. Where a New Jersey film-lease partner facility has not yet received a temporary or final certificate of occupancy, NJEDA requires the production company to have entered a lease or sublease of not less than three years that includes at least 36,000 square feet of soundstage space, plus an executed services contract with the owner or developer. That is a real commitment made against a building site.

Our advice, crew to crew: never let a rendering into your schedule. Confirm operational status directly with any facility before you promise a stage to a director, and treat every “opening soon” date, including every one in this article, as a claim to re-verify the week you budget. If you are shooting this year, plan around what exists: a deep bench of small and mid-size operating stages, a shorter list of large purpose-built ones, an excellent location inventory, and a growing network of towns with trained film liaisons and formal permitting.

Information checked July 31, 2026