NVIDIA reported record revenue of $96.2 billion for the second quarter of its 2027 fiscal year on 26 August, up 106% from a year earlier and 18% from the previous quarter. The company told investors it expects about $108 billion in the current quarter, plus or minus 2%.
A data centre company that also makes graphics cards
The quarter ended on 26 July 2026, and the shape of the numbers is familiar by now, only bigger. Data centre revenue reached $89.0 billion, up 117% year on year. Put simply, more than nine of every ten dollars NVIDIA earned came from the chips, systems and networking that go into AI data centres.
I still remember when NVIDIA was mainly the gaming GPU company. That identity has not disappeared, but in the financial results it is now a footnote next to the data centre line.
Profitability held up at that scale. Gross margin came in at 75.0%. Diluted earnings per share were $2.46 on a GAAP basis and $2.22 on a non-GAAP basis. The company also returned $26.0 billion to shareholders during the quarter and has $99.0 billion left in its share buyback authorisation.
By the numbers
| Item | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Quarterly revenue | $96.2 billion, up 106% YoY, up 18% QoQ | NVIDIA |
| Data centre revenue | $89.0 billion, up 117% YoY | NVIDIA |
| Gross margin | 75.0% | NVIDIA |
| Diluted EPS | $2.46 GAAP, $2.22 non-GAAP | NVIDIA |
| Outlook for next quarter | $108.0 billion, plus or minus 2% | NVIDIA |
| Returned to shareholders in the quarter | $26.0 billion | NVIDIA |
| Remaining buyback authorisation | $99.0 billion | NVIDIA |
Why it matters
This is a news report on a company’s results, not investment advice. I am not telling anyone to buy or sell NVIDIA shares, and the figures above say nothing on their own about what the stock will do next.
What the figures do tell us is where the AI build-out stands. Revenue that doubles in a year for a company already this large means the spending on AI infrastructure has not slowed. The guidance matters as much as the result: $108 billion would be roughly $12 billion more than this quarter, and NVIDIA is prepared to put that number in writing.
It also lines up with what Jensen Huang said on stage at GTC in March. Launching the Vera Rubin platform, he told the audience: “I see through 2027 at least $1 trillion” in Blackwell and Rubin demand, double the $500 billion figure he gave a year before. At the time that sounded like a keynote line. Two quarters of results later, it looks more like a sales pipeline. NVIDIA said then that AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Oracle would offer Vera Rubin from the second half of 2026, which is the period we are entering now.
For readers in the Arab world, the connection is direct, because the region’s biggest AI projects are being built on NVIDIA hardware. Last November, Saudi Arabia’s HUMAIN announced plans for up to 600,000 NVIDIA GPUs over three years, including up to 150,000 that AWS plans to deploy in a Riyadh “AI Zone”. NVIDIA does not break out its Gulf customers, but projects on this scale are the kind of demand that sits behind an $89 billion data centre line. When NVIDIA’s supply, pricing and product timing shift, the timelines of data centres across the Gulf shift with them.
For local developers and startups, the practical takeaway is less exciting but useful: the demand for top-end GPUs remains intense. If you rent AI compute in the region, it is sensible to plan capacity early and not assume that the newest chips will be easy to reserve at short notice. That is my reading of the results, not a figure from NVIDIA.
What to watch
- Whether NVIDIA lands within its $108 billion guidance range for the current quarter.
- The arrival of Vera Rubin at the big cloud providers in the second half of 2026, as NVIDIA announced at GTC.
- Progress on the HUMAIN build-out in Saudi Arabia, including the AWS “AI Zone” in Riyadh.
- How the data centre share of revenue evolves, since it now drives almost all of the growth.
Sources
- NVIDIA, “NVIDIA Announces Financial Results for Second Quarter Fiscal 2027”, 26 August 2026, https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-announces-financial-results-for-second-quarter-fiscal-2027
- Tom’s Hardware, live blog of the NVIDIA GTC 2026 keynote, 16 March 2026, https://www.tomshardware.com/news/live/nvidia-gtc-2026-keynote-live-blog-jensen-huang
- NVIDIA Newsroom, announcement of the Vera Rubin platform, March 2026, https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-vera-rubin-platform
- HUMAIN release via PR Newswire, expanded partnership with NVIDIA, xAI and AWS, 19 November 2025, https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/humain-expands-strategic-partnership-with-nvidia-advancing-global-ai-infrastructure-with-xai-global-ai-and-aws-at-the-us-saudi-investment-forum-302620854.html