OpenAI books $10B in Q3 revenue as Anthropic pulls ahead

OpenAI collected $10 billion in revenue during the third quarter of 2026, The Information reported on November 10, 2026, a roughly 50% climb from the quarter before. The heaviest lift came from demand for OpenAI's APIs, the plumbing that lets other companies wire its models into their own products. Buyers flocked to newer models including GPT-5.6 and Astra, and advertising sales added to the total.

The customer base is tilting corporate. Co-founder Greg Brockman said more than half of OpenAI's revenue now comes from enterprise clients. He also put annualized revenue growth at 70% quarter-over-quarter — a separate measure from the roughly 50% rise in actual quarterly revenue — which left OpenAI running at around $50 billion as of the end of September 2026. At the start of the year, that figure was about $20 billion.

That run rate is expected to push past $70 billion by year's end, with enterprise sales expected to carry much of the load. The roughly $50 billion projection for the end of September reportedly stirred some investor unease after it landed short of certain expectations.

OpenAI's momentum is visible in Microsoft's numbers too. The software giant said it generated $10 billion from commercial engagements tied to OpenAI in its fiscal quarter ending September 30, 2026 — almost 11% of its $92.3 billion in total quarterly revenue. Across fiscal 2026, Microsoft's OpenAI-linked revenue reached $24.1 billion.

Not everyone in the race is chasing. Rival Anthropic announced nearly $17 billion in revenue for the same period, putting it ahead of OpenAI on quarterly revenue in Q3. The number to watch next is OpenAI's year-end run rate and whether it clears the expected $70 billion mark.