Google CEO Sundar Pichai looks on during the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi on February 19, 2026.
Ludovic Marin | AFP | getty images
alphabet first quarter reported Income After the bell on Wednesday, it showed revenue that far exceeded expectations driven by its growing cloud business. Shares rose after the report.
- earnings per share: $5.11
- Income: $109.9 billion vs Analysts surveyed by LSEG expected $107.2 billion
It’s unclear whether EPS was on par with the $2.63 expected by analysts surveyed by LSEG.
Wall Street was also tracking several other numbers in the report:
- Google Cloud: $20.02 billion vs. Estimated at $18.05 billion according to StreetAccount
- YouTube Ads: $9.88 vs. $9.99 billion estimated according to StreetAccount
- Traffic Acquisition Cost: $15.22 vs. $15.3 billion estimated according to StreetAccount
The company beat Wall Street expectations in terms of revenue, which grew 20% from last year and recorded its highest growth rate for any quarter since 2022.
“Our enterprise AI solutions have become our primary growth driver for the cloud for the first time ever,” CEO Sundar Pichai told analysts on the earnings call.
Pichai said in a release that Gemini Enterprise’s paid monthly active users have increased by 40% compared to the previous quarter.
The company also updated its 2026 capital spending guidance range to $180 billion to $190 billion, up from its previous estimate of $175 billion to $185 billion. Alphabet had said in December that it would acquire data center company Intersect for $4.75 billion in cash and debt.
CFO Anat Ashkenazi also said he expects the company’s 2027 CapEx to “significantly increase” compared to 2026.
Alphabet reported capital spending of $35.7 billion during the quarter. This includes real estate, servers, data centers, and other infrastructure. Alphabet is investing money in AI infrastructure to capitalize on growing demand.
“We are limited in our calculations in the near term,” Pichai said on the earnings call. “If we had been able to meet the demand our cloud revenues would have been higher.”
Alphabet 1-day stock chart.
Alphabet stock has outperformed its Magnificent Seven peers this month, rising 21%, and tech stocks are poised to wrap up their best month since April 2020, with the Nasdaq up 14% for the month as of Wednesday’s close.
Wall Street is investing in the sector despite concerns that rising oil prices and supply chain disruptions caused by the war in Iran will increase the cost of AI infrastructure. Four Hyperscalers – Alphabet, Amazon, meta And Microsoft – All reported results on Wednesday, updating investors for the first time since the US launched war operations in Iran in late February.
Alphabet’s net income for Q1 2026 came to $62.57 billion, or $5.11 per share, up 81% from a year earlier. A year earlier, net income was $34.54 billion, or $2.81 a share.
Google Cloud reported a 63% increase in revenue from a year earlier, beating Wall Street expectations. Google’s cloud unit houses most of the company’s AI services and products.
The company said the growth was driven by growth in enterprise AI solutions and enterprise AI infrastructure in Google Cloud Platform (GCP). The company said that Google Cloud is owed $460 billion.
Search had a strong quarter driven by AI experiences, with queries at an all-time high with 19% revenue growth.
Google’s advertising revenue was $77.25 billion, up 15.5% from the same period last year.
YouTube advertising missed Wall Street expectations, reporting $9.88 billion in the quarter. Chief business officer Philip Schindler said YouTube subscriptions are now growing faster than YouTube ads.
Other bets, including Alphabet’s self-driving car company Waymo, earned $411 million — down from $450 million in the same period last year. During the quarter, Waymo surpassed 500,000 fully autonomous rides a week, the company said Wednesday.
Waymo announced in February that it raised $16 billion in a new round led by outside investors, valuing the company at $126 billion. Waymo recently said it is ready to bring its self-driving vehicles to Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Orlando. During the quarter, the company launched fully autonomous operations in Nashville, ahead of the planned commercial launch lift later this year.
Watch: AWS and Google Cloud should see strong upside
