OpenAI CFO teases new money-making plans as AI giant targets 'practical adoption' gains in 2026 and beyond

OpenAI has confirmed speculation that its revenue topped $20 billion this year and said the company's next goal is "practical adoption".

Heavy spending on infrastructure across the AI industry has sparked concerns of a bubble that may burst before any real gains are realized from the technology. The ChatGPT developer went on a spending spree in 2025, with deals worth hundreds of billions of dollars each with Oracle, Nvidia, and AMD, among others.

OpenAI has also reportedly sought new ways to boost revenue streams, announcing plans last week to start showing adverts to some ChatGPT users.

Sarah Friar, OpenAI's chief financial officer, said in a blog post that the company's revenue topped $20 billion in 2025, suggesting it was tripling annually to match the rate of compute available.

"Looking back on the past three years, our ability to serve customers—as measured by revenue—directly tracks available compute: Compute grew 3X year over year or 9.5X from 2023 to 2025: 0.2 GW in 2023, 0.6 GW in 2024, and ~1.9 GW in 2025," she said.

"While revenue followed the same curve growing 3X year over year, or 10X from 2023 to 2025: $2B ARR [annualized run rate] in 2023, $6B in 2024, and $20B+ in 2025."

She added: "This is never-before-seen growth at such scale. And we firmly believe that more compute in these periods would have led to faster customer adoption and monetization."

OpenAI needs more compute power

Friar suggested that a drive for more compute capacity was one reason that OpenAI's exclusive partnership with Microsoft ended last year as the company sought to widen provider options.

"Three years ago, we relied on a single compute provider," she noted. "Today, we are working with providers across a diversified ecosystem. That shift gives us resilience and, critically, compute certainty. We can plan, finance, and deploy capacity with confidence in a market where access to compute defines who can scale."

She suggested the aim of scaling compute was to keep down the costs of AI workloads, to make access to the technology viable for "everyday" users.

Exactly how people use ChatGPT has been a point of contention over the last two years, particularly as the company looks to drive enterprise adoption of its AI solutions. OpenAI-backed research suggested more than 70% of ChatGPT queries have nothing to do with work, but are about how to write or personal questions.

The next big hurdle, Friar noted, will be bolstering “practical adoption” of the technology across both the consumer and enterprise domains.

"The priority is closing the gap between what AI now makes possible and how people, companies, and countries are using it day to day," she said. "The opportunity is large and immediate, especially in health, science, and enterprise, where better intelligence translates directly into better outcomes."

From a technology standpoint, she said the next phase for AI is agents and automation that can take action, run continuously and maintain context over time.

"For individuals, that means AI that manages projects, coordinates plans, and executes tasks," Friar said. "For organizations, it becomes an operating layer for knowledge work."

How is OpenAI paying for it all?

OpenAI has made no secret of its lavish spending over the last 18 months and it faces a growing list of bills. To compensate for this, Friar added that new business models will emerge, including licensing, IP-based agreements and "outcome-based pricing".

What this suggests is that OpenAI is hoping to earn revenue from what partners create using its tools.

Beyond that, OpenAI last week said it was introducing advertising in ChatGPT for some users – notably anyone using the app for free or with a budget ChatGPT GO subscription – to further expand its revenue sources.

In a blog post detailing the announcement, the company said the ads will be kept separate from the chat bot and it will "never sell your data" to advertisers, who won't be able to influence answers to queries.

OpenAI's policy chief Chris Lehane told Axios that the company is "on track" to release an AI device in the second half of this year, widely expected after the acquisition of Jonny Ive's hardware startup io Products last year.

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