OpenAI's July Revenue Surpassed Entire Second Quarter, CFO Says

OpenAI's revenue growth accelerated dramatically in July, with the month's annualized recurring revenue surpassing the total for the entire second quarter, Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar told employees. The disclosure, made during an internal meeting on Wednesday, was reported by CNBC, which reviewed a partial transcript of the event.

A Surge in Growth

During the meeting, which also included board chair Bret Taylor, Friar highlighted the significance of the growth by noting that the second quarter's performance was already strong. "And Q2 was no slouch," Friar said, according to the transcript reviewed by CNBC.

The executives attributed the revenue surge to several key factors, including:

• The release of the GPT-5.6 series of models.
• The launch of a new enterprise agent called ChatGPT Work.
• Increased adoption of its AI coding assistant, Codex.

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Competitive Pressure and IPO Outlook

The rapid top-line growth comes as OpenAI seeks to justify its valuation of over $800 billion ahead of a widely anticipated initial public offering. The company faces intensifying competition from well-funded rivals such as Google and Anthropic, as well as from lower-cost, open-weight models emerging from international competitors.

Most recently, China’s Moonshot AI released its Kimi K3 model in July, which it claims outperforms models from OpenAI and Anthropic on certain benchmarks. OpenAI is expected to file for its IPO in the coming quarters, making sustained revenue momentum critical for investor confidence.