AMD Expects to Top Intel in Quarterly Revenue for the First Time After Record Third Quarter
AMD reported record third-quarter revenue of $13.4 billion and forecast about $17 billion for the fourth quarter, above Intel's $15 billion to $16 billion outlook. If both companies meet their forecasts, AMD would outsell Intel in a quarter for the first time.
Advanced Micro Devices reported record third-quarter revenue of $13.4 billion on Tuesday, up 45% from a year earlier and 16% from the previous quarter, as demand for its data center chips nearly doubled.
Net income rose 95% from a year earlier to $2.4 billion. The company’s Data Center division brought in $8.5 billion, up 97% from a year earlier and equal to 64% of total revenue, driven by its EPYC server processors and Instinct AI accelerators. AMD said Anthropic, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure are already running workloads on its first Helios rack-scale systems, which use Instinct MI450 accelerators and 6th Gen EPYC chips.
“We delivered a record quarter with revenue exceeding the high end of our guidance as Data Center segment sales nearly doubled year-over-year,” AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su said. “Demand for our Instinct and EPYC products continued to strengthen, and we expect growth to accelerate further in the fourth quarter as we scale Helios and ‘Venice’ production.”
The fourth-quarter forecast that puts AMD ahead
For the current quarter, AMD expects revenue of about $17 billion, plus or minus 3%, or between $16.49 billion and $17.51 billion. Intel has guided for fourth-quarter revenue of $15 billion to $16 billion, with a midpoint of about $15.5 billion. Even the low end of AMD’s range sits above the top end of Intel’s range, so if both companies land near their forecasts, AMD would report more quarterly revenue than Intel for the first time in its history. AMD’s forecast also came in above the consensus estimate of $16.23 billion, and its shares rose by as much as 9% in pre-market trading, according to HotHardware.
Intel, for its part, reported third-quarter sales of $16.5 billion, up 21% from a year earlier, with data center sales up 78% to $7.3 billion. But the company warned that the slowdown in PC sales will continue at least through the first half of next year, and it expects PC-related revenue to fall more than 20% from the third quarter to the fourth, according to Wccftech.
One soft spot in AMD’s quarter
Not every part of AMD’s business grew. Client and Gaming revenue slipped 8% from a year earlier to $3.7 billion: client revenue rose 7% to $2.9 billion, while gaming revenue fell 40% to $773 million on weaker semi-custom and graphics chip sales. Looking further ahead, AMD said it expects revenue to grow by more than 80% in 2027, and it expects Data Center AI revenue to pass server CPU revenue in the fourth quarter of 2026.
Reporting based on coverage by HotHardware and Wccftech.
