AWS revenue grew 39%, and Jassy now talks about a trillion-dollar business

AWS revenue reached $46.0 billion in the third quarter, up 39% from $33.0 billion a year earlier, Amazon reported on 29 October. That is the fastest growth in nearly five years. On the call, chief executive Andy Jassy said AWS could become a trillion-dollar revenue business "in the next five to 10 years" and that it can grow "north of 40%" in both 2027 and 2028.

Investors heard the other half of the plan: Amazon will spend "meaningfully more" in 2027 than the roughly $220 billion it expects this year. The shares fell about 6% after hours.

What AWS earns

• Revenue: $46.0 billion, a $184 billion annual run rate.
• Operating income: $17.8 billion, against $11.4 billion a year ago. The margin rose from 34.6% to 38.7%.
• Backlog: $578 billion of signed contracts, more than double a year earlier.
• AWS brought 63% of Amazon's $28.1 billion operating profit.

Amazon also signed a new AWS deal with OpenAI and put GPT models into Bedrock next to Anthropic's Claude, so customers can buy inference on both from one AWS bill. Net income came to $20.7 billion, slightly below last year's $21.2 billion, because the 2025 quarter included a $9.5 billion pre-tax gain on Amazon's Anthropic stake.

What Amazon spends

Amazon paid $77.3 billion for property and equipment in the quarter, up from $35.1 billion. Over twelve months the figure is $215.2 billion. Operating cash flow grew 29% to $168.3 billion, which did not cover it: free cash flow went from a $14.8 billion inflow to a $42.4 billion outflow.

“There has never been a business with a trillion dollars of annual revenue”

— Andy Jassy, Amazon CEO, on the third-quarter earnings call, 29 October 2026, as quoted by TechCrunch, https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/29/aws-will-be-a-1t-business-jassy-says-but-first-it-will-spend-big/

Jassy called AI a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" and said: "We can fund this plan, and I think it will forever change the size of Amazon."

Our count

• From a $184 billion run rate, a trillion takes about 40% a year for five years, or about 18.4% a year for ten. Jassy's "north of 40%" is the five-year version.
• In the quarter Amazon spent $1.68 on equipment for every dollar of AWS revenue, and $4.34 for every dollar of AWS operating profit.
• The $578 billion backlog covers just over three years of current AWS revenue.
• The free cash flow swing over a year is $57.2 billion.

Customers have already signed for three years of AWS revenue at today's pace, and that backlog is Jassy's best argument. The five-year path is harder: it needs 40% growth to hold every year while the capex bill keeps rising. This month investors in Seoul marked an AI data center IPO down 33% on its first day, a reminder of how they treat AI spending that has not paid back yet.

For Amazon, watch the fourth-quarter guide of $28.5 to $33.5 billion in operating income, and the 2027 capex number when it comes with the fourth-quarter results.

This news piece is not a recommendation to buy or sell Amazon shares. Figures come from Amazon's third-quarter release, quotes from the call as reported by TechCrunch.