Between the second and third quarters, OpenAI's revenue climbed by about 50%, reaching $10 billion, yet steep operating losses persisted, according to The Wall Street Journal, in a mixed showing as the company tries to close the gap with market leader Anthropic.
Investors received the latest figures on Tuesday, just ahead of Anthropic's long-awaited IPO next week. The maker of Claude recently reported third-quarter revenue of $17 billion and an operating loss of $567 million. Although the figures point to quickening growth at OpenAI, the company remains well behind its rival in both revenue and operational efficiency. Second-quarter revenue had risen only 18% over the first, The Wall Street Journal previously reported.
Documents that The Wall Street Journal viewed show that on Tuesday OpenAI informed investors that the operating margin, as adjusted, moved from minus 150% during the second quarter to minus 109% in the third, though by those same figures, losses on that adjusted basis edged up slightly: $10.9 billion now, against $10.1 billion before.
Anthropic's loss figure includes stock-based compensation, whereas OpenAI's calculations leave out that cost, which reached $2.6 billion during the third quarter, a person familiar with the matter said. Having cut prices on its newest models to win market share, OpenAI is vying with Anthropic for corporate customers buying AI tools, and it recently brought on Dali Rajic as chief revenue officer to lead that push, as enterprise accounts make up a steadily larger portion of total sales.
Roughly 100 million people now pay for ChatGPT, OpenAI told investors, equal to 8.5% of weekly active users overall, a slightly higher share than the previous quarter's, hinting at headway in converting more users of the most widely used consumer chatbot globally into subscribers. Earlier this year, OpenAI rolled out ads on ChatGPT, which it expects will boost margins, though figures for the segment were not available.
Anthropic, buoyed by Claude Code, its well-liked coding tool, overtook OpenAI in sales earlier this year, and it has operated more efficiently, even earning a modest profit from operations during the second quarter. With a public listing planned for next year, OpenAI is betting that a rebound in business will carry it back to the front of the AI race.
Whereas OpenAI must sustain a sizable consumer operation and research efforts spanning fields such as robotics and imaging, Anthropic has concentrated on enterprise products, which leaves its revenue more heavily tied to those customers.
Outside data indicate that, as some companies started looking for cheaper alternatives to Claude, OpenAI narrowed the distance to Anthropic during the third quarter. Earlier this month at a tech conference held in Napa Valley, Greg Brockman, the company's president, said the year's first two quarters were difficult, but the third brought an "incredible revenue inflection," and he also referred to a new arrangement with JPMorgan Chase.
The documents showed that in 2025's third quarter OpenAI reported sales of $3.9 billion and a margin on operations of minus 97%. A tech-stock selloff has hurt both companies. OpenAI raised less than half of its $30 billion financing target and is still seeking backers, while Anthropic is targeting a $1.33 trillion public valuation, down from roughly $2 trillion floated months ago.
