TL;DR
- Revenue Milestone: OpenAI reached $25 billion in annualized revenue at the end of February 2026, growing 17% in just two months.
- Closing the Gap: Anthropic surged to nearly $19 billion in annualized revenue, with Claude Code alone generating $2.5 billion annually.
- Profitability Challenge: Despite record revenues, both companies remain unprofitable, with OpenAI not expecting to break even until 2030.
- IPO Plans: OpenAI is preparing for a potential 2026 IPO, facing pressure to improve margins ahead of public-market scrutiny.
The Information reports OpenAI crossing $25 billion in annualized revenue at the end of February – growing 17% in two months from the $21.4 billion it was generating at year-end 2025, per people familiar with the company’s financials.
Meanwhile, rival Anthropic has also closed the gap, reaching nearly $19 billion in annualized revenue – a figure that signals how swiftly the AI sector has monetized at scale.
From effectively zero revenue in late 2022 to that milestone in just over three years, OpenAI’s scaling trajectory stands apart in enterprise software. According to The Information, that 17% two-month pace suggests the company’s acceleration has not plateaued – a signal that typically precedes further step-changes in enterprise contract volume. Even so, the narrowing gap with Anthropic underscores how fast competitive dynamics are shifting.
Anthropic Closes the Gap
Anthropic’s narrowing gap with OpenAI is the defining competitive story of the AI revenue race. The company’s run rate surpassing $19 billion – nearly three times its end-of-2025 level and up roughly 36% in just two weeks – demonstrates how rapidly the company has scaled enterprise demand.
According to Anthropic’s recent Series G announcement, the company closed a $30 billion funding round at a $380 billion post-money valuation, nearly doubling its prior-round valuation in under six months.
“Claude is increasingly becoming critical to how businesses work,” said Krishna Rao, Anthropic’s CFO.
Claude Code Fuels the Surge
That enterprise momentum traces back to one breakout product. According to Anthropic’s Series G announcement, enterprise clients account for 80% of its revenue, with eight of the Fortune 10 as active customers and 500+ enterprise clients each spending over $1 million annually – up from just a dozen two years ago.
Furthermore, according to Anthropic, Claude Code now generates $2.5 billion in annualized revenue, more than double its January 2026 pace, with weekly active users also doubling in that period. Anthropic’s Series G materials also cited that 4% of all public GitHub commits globally were authored by Claude Code – double the share from just one month prior.
The Claude Code numbers indicate that Anthropic has found a durable wedge into enterprise software budgets that competitors will struggle to displace. Moreover, the jump from a dozen to more than 500 enterprise clients each spending seven figures annually positions the company to compound revenue through contract expansion rather than new-customer acquisition alone.
Profits Remain Elusive
Yet that top-line growth has come at a steep cost. Both OpenAI and Anthropic missed their margin targets, with escalating frontier AI infrastructure costs continuing to outpace revenue gains.
OpenAI’s gross margin fell to 33% in 2025, down from 40% the prior year, on $13.1 billion in total revenue.
OpenAI’s cash burn trajectory is equally daunting, annual burn is projected to reach $57 billion by 2027, with profitability not expected until 2030. Anthropic, by contrast, is targeting breakeven as early as 2028 – two years ahead on the path to sustainable operations.
Building on that gap, the 2028 versus 2030 profitability differential creates a meaningful fundraising advantage for Anthropic. Investors backing a company two years closer to breakeven face substantially less dilution risk. Those compressed margins will also draw direct scrutiny from public-market investors, who typically demand software-like returns before assigning premium valuations.
OpenAI’s IPO Push
That 2030 profitability target has added urgency to OpenAI’s IPO preparations. The company is actively preparing for a potential IPO as early as 2026, having selected law firms Cooley and Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz to lead preparations, per people familiar with the matter. CFO Sarah Friar oversees financial governance as the company readies for public-market scrutiny.
In contrast, Anthropic raised $13 billion in a 2025 funding round, cementing its status as OpenAI’s top challenger. Its valuation has more than doubled in the six months since, reflecting accelerating commercial momentum.
For enterprise teams and developers whose workflows depend on these platforms, the financial durability of each company is no longer an abstract investor concern. With OpenAI’s IPO potentially arriving in 2026, both companies face growing pressure to demonstrate a credible path to profitability – and public-market investors will closely scrutinize whether margins can recover alongside revenue.