Microsoft records $10bn from OpenAI in a quarter, 11% of revenue

“For the three months ended September 30, 2026, we recorded revenue from commercial arrangements with OpenAI, inclusive of revenue-sharing payments, of $10.0 billion,” the filing said. It is the first time Microsoft has given a quarterly figure for the arrangement, Todd Bishop reported for GeekWire. The filing does not split the $10bn between revenue sharing and OpenAI’s spending on Azure. Microsoft must disclose the business because OpenAI counts as a related party under accounting rules, GeekWire reported.

The OpenAI line was larger than Xbox, which brought in $5.4bn in the same quarter, and search and advertising, at $6.6bn, GeekWire reported. For the 12 months to June, Microsoft recorded $24.1bn from OpenAI, about $6bn a quarter on average. The September quarter was a step up. OpenAI owed Microsoft $7.2bn at the end of September, up from $6.0bn in June, the filing showed.

Stake and terms

Microsoft owns about 24% of OpenAI, down from about 25% in June and about 27% after OpenAI’s October 2025 restructuring, TechCrunch reported. Microsoft did not say what caused the dilution.

Looser ties

The October 2025 restructuring relaxed the formerly exclusive partnership and ended exclusivity provisions in effect since 2019. Microsoft gave up its right of first refusal to supply OpenAI’s computing capacity, and OpenAI committed to buy another $250bn of Azure services, The Verge reported. TNW reported that an April 2026 agreement gave OpenAI broader freedom to use other cloud providers, and that OpenAI recently brought its models to rival Google Cloud.

Revenue share

TechCrunch reported that OpenAI will keep sharing revenue with Microsoft through 2030, subject to a cap. Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives put the cap at $38bn through 2030 and said removing OpenAI’s option to defer payments to 2032 means Microsoft gets about $6bn this year, not the $4bn previously expected. The Times of India reported that OpenAI shares about 20% of its revenue with Microsoft, a figure neither company has confirmed. The Verge reported that the revenue-share agreement remains until an independent panel verifies AGI, with payments made over a longer period. CNBC gave the same AGI trigger. The reports do not reconcile the 2030 end date with the AGI trigger.

On the earnings call, Bernstein analyst Mark Moerdler asked where Azure's AI growth was coming from. Chief executive Satya Nadella did not mention OpenAI, GeekWire reported. He said he did not want Azure's AI business to depend on "four customers who buy a lot of capacity from you". Nadella wrote on X after the call that Azure's growth was broad-based across large and small businesses.

Microsoft has not said how much of the $10bn came from revenue sharing and how much from OpenAI’s Azure spending.