Nvidia beats on Q4; ai demand drives record revenue as Ai outlook tops estimates
Nvidia reported record fourth-quarter revenue and a first-quarter revenue outlook that exceeded Wall Street estimates, driven by surging data-center sales tied to ai deployments. The numbers underlined the company’s momentum even as the stock slipped on investor caution about the broader AI trade.
Quarterly and fiscal tallies: revenue, margins and earnings
NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) said revenue for the fourth quarter ended January 25, 2026, was $68. 1 billion, up 20% from the prior quarter and up 73% from a year earlier. For fiscal 2026, the company reported revenue of $215. 9 billion, up 65% from a year ago.
For the quarter, GAAP earnings per diluted share were $1. 76 and non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $1. 62; the headline EPS figure of $1. 62 on $68. 1 billion in revenue was highlighted alongside those GAAP figures. For fiscal 2026, GAAP and non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $4. 90 and $4. 77, respectively.
Gross margins for the quarter were 75. 0% on a GAAP basis and 75. 2% on a non-GAAP basis. For fiscal 2026, GAAP gross margin was 71. 1% and non-GAAP gross margin was 71. 3%.
Data Center: compute gains, networking surge and customer mix
Data center revenue drove the bulk of growth, totaling $62. 3 billion for the period, ahead of analysts' projections of $60. 2 billion. The company breaks down its data center business into compute, graphics chips and CPUs, and networking.
Compute revenue grew 58% year over year, while networking revenue jumped 263% to $11 billion.
CFO Colette Kress, NVIDIA’s executive vice president and chief financial officer, said much of the gain came from hyperscalers. She added that hyperscaler revenue increased and remained the largest customer category at slightly over 50% of Data Center revenue, while growth was led by the rest of Data Center customers as revenue diversified.
Guidance, shareholder returns and accounting changes
Nvidia offered first-quarter guidance between $76. 44 billion and $79. 56 billion, above Wall Street estimates of $72. 8 billion.
During fiscal 2026, the company returned $41. 1 billion to shareholders through share repurchases and cash dividends. As of the end of the fourth quarter, Nvidia had $58. 5 billion remaining under its share repurchase authorization. The company will pay its next quarterly cash dividend of $0. 01 per share on April 1, 2026, to shareholders of record on March 11, 2026.
Beginning in the first quarter of fiscal 2027, Nvidia will include stock-based compensation expense in non-GAAP financial measures; the company called stock-based compensation a foundational component of its compensation program to attract and retain world-class talent.
NVIDIA’s outlook for the first quarter of fiscal 2027 is unclear in the provided context.
Market reaction, share performance and investor debate
Despite the beat, Nvidia stock fell more than 4% on Thursday as investors weighed the results against broader anxiety about the AI trade. As of Wednesday afternoon the stock was up just over 5% since the start of the year.
Other chip companies showed mixed moves year to date: Advanced Micro Devices was down roughly 1%, Broadcom was off about 3%, and Intel was up almost 27%.
Gene Munster, managing partner at Deepwater Asset Management, wrote that the disconnect between Nvidia’s announcements and its stock performance hinges on expectations for 2027 and 2028. "The real debate is what growth looks like in 2027 and 2028, " Munster wrote. "Ultimately, investors have to decide what inning of the AI buildout we are in, if it's the fifth inning, 2027 growth should look more modest, and if it is the second inning, which I believe, Nvidia’s growth outlook over the next several years remains robust. "
Ai superchips, GTC 2026 and the Meta agreement
CEO Jensen Huang framed the quarter in the context of accelerating ai demand, saying, "Computing demand is growing exponentially — the agentic AI inflection point has arrived. Grace Blackwell with NVLink is the king of inference today — delivering an order-of-magnitude lower cost per token — and Vera Rubin will extend that leadership even further. " He added: "Enterprise adoption of agents is skyrocketing. Our customers are racing to invest in AI compute — the factories powering the AI industrial revolution and their future growth. "
The results follow the launch of Nvidia’s latest AI superchip, Vera Rubin, at the CES technology conference in Las Vegas in January. The company also expanded an agreement with Meta that will provide Meta with both Blackwell and Rubin AI processors and the first major standalone deployment of its Grace CPU servers.
Nvidia is due to host GTC 2026 in San Jose, California, a few weeks after the quarter, where it is expected to make a number of major product announcements.
Other revenue streams, capital plans and conference call timing
Outside the data center, gaming revenue totaled $3. 7 billion for the quarter versus estimates of $4 billion. The company could also launch its own CPU for laptops in the coming months, which would serve as a boost to gaming revenue.
Hyperscalers such as Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft are expected to drive much of the build-out this year; those companies plan to spend a collective $650 billion on AI capital expenditures in 2026.
Nvidia will conduct a conference call with analysts and investors to discuss its fourth-quarter and fiscal 2026 results at 2 p. m. Pacific time (5 p. m. Eastern time). A live, listen-only webcast of the conference call will be accessible at Nvidia’s investor relations website; the webcast will be recorded and available for replay until the company’s conference call for its first quarter of fiscal 2027.
To supplement its GAAP statements, Nvidia uses non-GAAP measures and provided reconciliations for fiscal years 2025 and 2026 that adjust related GAAP financial measures to exclude stock-based compensation expense, acquisition-related and other costs, and other gains or losses.
