Nvidia Earnings: Record $68.1B Quarter, Data Center Boom and Fiscal 2026 Results
The latest Nvidia Earnings release shows a record fourth-quarter revenue haul of $68. 1 billion for the quarter ended January 25, 2026, rising 20% from the prior quarter and 73% year over year, while fiscal 2026 revenue reached $215. 9 billion, up 65% from a year earlier. These headline figures underscore how deeply the company’s performance is tied to surging demand for AI compute: the data center business grew 75% year over year to $62. 3 billion and the company posted an enormous total profit for the fiscal year of $120 billion.
Nvidia Earnings — quarter metrics, margins and EPS
For the quarter, GAAP gross margin was 75. 0% and non-GAAP gross margin was 75. 2%. For fiscal 2026, GAAP and non-GAAP gross margins were 71. 1% and 71. 3%, respectively. Quarterly GAAP earnings per diluted share were $1. 76 and non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $1. 62; for the fiscal year, GAAP EPS was $4. 90 and non-GAAP EPS was $4. 77.
Some coverage of the quarter lists the period revenue at $68. 13 billion and notes that Wall Street estimates for the quarter had been lower; one referenced consensus estimate was $66. 2 billion. The company’s non-GAAP EPS of $1. 62 also exceeded an illustrative analyst estimate of $1. 53.
Market reaction was volatile: shares rose by roughly 3% in after-hours trading immediately following the earnings announcement before those gains eased to less than 1% as the day progressed.
Data center surge and AI demand
The data center segment—responsible for the vast majority of revenue—registered 75% year-over-year growth to $62. 3 billion in the quarter, a central driver of the company’s record numbers. The company is described as the world’s most valuable publicly traded company and is portrayed as having a dominant position in the chip market, with its processing units characterized as the backbone of the current artificial intelligence boom.
Company leadership framed the moment as an agentic AI inflection point. Jensen Huang, founder and CEO, said that enterprise adoption of agents is accelerating and that customers are racing to invest in AI compute. Huang highlighted specific technology and personnel names, noting that Grace Blackwell with NVLink is the king of inference today—delivering an order-of-magnitude lower cost per token—and that Vera Rubin will extend that leadership further.
Shareholder returns, dividend and repurchase authority
During fiscal 2026 the company returned $41. 1 billion to shareholders share repurchases and cash dividends. As of the end of the fourth quarter, $58. 5 billion remained under the company’s share repurchase authorization. The next quarterly cash dividend is set at $0. 01 per share, payable on April 1, 2026, to shareholders of record on March 11, 2026.
Outlook, non-GAAP changes and corporate communications
Beginning in the first quarter of fiscal 2027, the company will include stock-based compensation expense in non-GAAP financial measures; the company describes stock-based compensation as a foundational component of its compensation program to attract and retain world-class talent. For the full year fiscal 2027, GAAP and non-GAAP tax rates are expected to be between 17. 0% and 19. 0%, excluding any discrete items and material changes to the company’s tax environment.
The company noted that it uses a range of non-GAAP measures—non-GAAP gross profit, non-GAAP gross margin, non-GAAP operating expenses, non-GAAP operating income, non-GAAP other income (expense), net, non-GAAP net income, non-GAAP earnings per diluted share, and free cash flow—and has provided reconciliations to help compare current results with prior periods. Those reconciliations adjust related GAAP measures to exclude stock-based compensation expense, acquisition-related and other costs, and other gains/losses fr unclear in the provided context.
Executive commentary by Colette Kress, executive vice president and chief financial officer, is available in the company’s posted materials. The company scheduled a conference call with analysts and investors today at 2 p. m. Pacific time (5 p. m. Eastern time) and said a live webcast in listen-only mode would be accessible on its investor relations website; that webcast will be recorded and available for replay until the company’s next quarterly results call.
Market context and deal scrutiny
The company has extended a yearslong streak of surpassing market expectations, having beaten Wall Street’s projections every quarter across multiple years and throughout the 2024 and 2025 fiscal years. That performance has acted as a market reassurance even as some investors have grown more skeptical about the scale of tech industry spending on AI infrastructure.
Heightened scrutiny has focused on large, multibillion-dollar deals with AI firms such as OpenAI. Critics point to a circularity in some transactions, where investments are followed by purchases of chips from the same company. One marquee proposed deal—a $100 billion investment into OpenAI—fell through earlier this month; instead the company will reportedly invest $30 billion into OpenAI while the ChatGPT creator seeks to go public later this year at a valuation around $730 billion. On the earnings call Jensen Huang said, "We continue to work with OpenAI towards a partnership agreement, and believe we are close, " and reiterated a broader view that "in this new world of AI, compute equals revenues. "
Huang has also moved to downplay concerns that AI will displace workers, speaking last month against fears of AI replacing software technologies amid a market selloff in software stocks, and framing AI at the World Economic Forum in Davos as a job creator that unlocks productivity and becomes a core part of international infrastructure. This week a separate piece of speculative fiction from a research firm triggered a market downturn and panic on W unclear in the provided context.
