Finance & Business

Business & Startups

Funding rounds, exits, and founder playbooks

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OpenAI revenue near $50B, $20B below earlier reports

OpenAI told investors its annualized revenue was approaching $50 billion at the end of September 2026, the Financial Times reported on October 8. That is about $20 billion below the figure of nearly $70 billion reported in late September. The gap hit AI stocks the same day and reopened a question for every company buying AI: how big is the market leader's business, really? Annualized revenue, or run rate, takes one recent month of sales and multiplies it by 12. It is a snapshot of pace, not a year's actual income. TechCrunch reports that Axios first put the run rate near $70 billion on September 29. Other outlets cited $68 billion. According to the FT, that larger number came from OpenAI's own investors. They built it to compare OpenAI directly with Anthropic. The difference comes down to accounting: How it counts sales through cloud partners Figure cited Anthropic Counts the full sale, including Claude sold by Amazon, Microsoft and Google More than $65 billion annualized at end of July OpenAI, as reported to investors Counts only its own share Approaching $50 billion at end of September OpenAI, investor estimate Adjusted to match Anthropic's method About $68 billion to $70 billion SiliconANGLE says a source described the $50 billion as net revenue. The higher figure included gross revenue from partners. The reports do not fully agree on where the $70 billion came from. The Next Web collected the competing accounts: The FT said it came from OpenAI's own investors comparing the company with Anthropic. The Information said earlier reports came from one unnamed investor's estimate. Reuters said OpenAI pointed to the figure at a separate investor event. Bloomberg reported on October 9 that $70 billion is OpenAI's run-rate target for the end of 2026. OpenAI declined to comment to Bloomberg. OpenAI's growth figures also come in two versions. A source told CNBC that the overall run rate grew 77% in the third quarter, and the enterprise business 107%. The Information report

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