Anthropic's second-quarter revenue surpassed US$11.5 billion, a year-on-year increase of more than 14 times

Zhitong Finance App learned that, according to a document, AI chatbot developer Anthropic PBC is revealing to potential investors that its second-quarter revenue increased at least 14 times over the same period last year. The AI startup recorded preliminary revenue data of over $11.5 billion in the latest quarter, compared to $787 million in the same period in 2025 and $4.73 billion in the first quarter of this year. The documents also show that Anthropic's adjusted operating profit for the second quarter of 2026 was positive.

Currently, the relevant review is still ongoing, and the data may be revised. An Anthropic spokesperson declined to comment.

At a time when revenue is growing rapidly, the company is competing with its old rival OpenAI for corporate customers. Anthropic was once seen as a laggard in the AI race, but now its software is being adopted by more and more professionals to streamline workflows such as coding.

Anthropic's annualized revenue (i.e. operating rate) surpassed $47 billion in May. According to reports, the annual operating rate of OpenAI exceeds 40 billion US dollars, but the calculation methods of the two may not be the same.

According to people familiar with the matter in July, the company is meeting with investors for its potential giant IPO. Earlier reports said that Anthropic has secretly submitted a listing application and is cooperating with Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and J.P. Morgan Chase to advance the IPO.

Anthropic is seeking to use the open market's ample financing capabilities to maintain its lead over OpenAI and other competitors—AI companies are currently spending hundreds of billions of dollars to develop cutting-edge models.

If it completes its IPO this fall, Anthropic will not only go public before OpenAI, but will also land on the open market before DeepSeek — the Chinese AI company continues to seize more and more market share. According to people familiar with the matter, DeepSeek is also preparing for an IPO and may submit an application as early as this year.

The AI competition has ignited the IPO market. According to the data, so far this year (excluding SPACs and other financial instruments), the IPO has raised 256.4 billion US dollars, setting a record for the highest amount of capital raised in a single year since 2021.