OpenAI revenue in July tops entire Q2 as GPT-5.6 and ChatGPT Work drive enterprise growth

OpenAI Revenue Accelerates Beyond Q2 Performance

OpenAI revenue momentum accelerated sharply in July, with annualized recurring revenue exceeding the entire second quarter's performance, CFO Sarah Friar disclosed during an internal employee meeting on Wednesday. "And Q2 was no slouch," Friar told staff, according to a partial transcript reviewed by CNBC1

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. The strong performance signals that OpenAI is maintaining its growth trajectory despite facing mounting pressure from rivals and cheaper open-source alternatives.

Friar and board chair Bret Taylor attributed the surge to three key product releases: the GPT-5.6 series of models, ChatGPT Work—the company's new enterprise AI agent—and growing adoption of Codex, its AI coding tool2

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. The Information previously reported in March that OpenAI had topped $25 billion in annualized recurring revenue, though the company has not disclosed specific figures for the recent period1

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Competing Against Anthropic in Enterprise Markets

The revenue update comes as OpenAI works to close the gap with Anthropic, which has emerged as a formidable competitor in the enterprise space. Anthropic said in May that its revenue run rate topped $47 billion, up from roughly $10 billion generated for all of 2025, largely driven by its Claude Code tool's success with developers1

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. Anthropic even surpassed OpenAI by valuation earlier this year, intensifying the competitive dynamics in the AI market.

Bret Taylor acknowledged during the meeting that Anthropic had established an early lead in the coding market, forcing OpenAI to play catch-up. However, he expressed optimism about Codex's trajectory. "You're seeing people who went deep on Claude Code, ended up with a very high bill, and started looking for an alternative," Taylor said2

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. This suggests that cost considerations may be driving some developers to explore OpenAI's offerings as an alternative to Anthropic's premium-priced solutions.

Massive AI Infrastructure Investments on the Horizon

OpenAI is racing to expand its enterprise and developer customer base to generate revenue that can support ambitious AI infrastructure investments. In February, the company told investors it plans to target roughly $600 billion in total compute spending by 20301

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. To fund these plans, OpenAI is currently in discussions with Nvidia about a backstop of up to $250 billion that would help lease a massive new AI data center in Ohio.

These staggering figures underscore the capital-intensive nature of maintaining leadership in AI development. The company faces pressure to justify its $852 billion valuation as it prepares for a potentially massive IPO1

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. Both OpenAI and Anthropic confidentially filed for IPO preparations with the Securities and Exchange Commission in June, though neither has disclosed a timeline for their public debuts2

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Rising Threat from Chinese AI Developers

Beyond competition from Anthropic and Google, OpenAI now faces a growing challenge from Chinese AI developers offering lower-cost open-source alternatives. Earlier this month, Moonshot AI unveiled Kimi K3, claiming it narrows the gap with leading U.S. offerings and surpasses OpenAI and Anthropic's most capable systems on some benchmarks1

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. The emergence of competitive open-weight models that can be accessed at significantly lower costs poses a strategic challenge to OpenAI's premium pricing model, particularly in price-sensitive markets. Sarah Friar and Bret Taylor's reassurances to employees suggest the leadership team is closely monitoring these competitive dynamics while betting that product innovation and enterprise features will help maintain OpenAI's market position.