AMD data center sales nearly double as Q4 guide hits $17 billion

All figures are for the quarter ended Sep 26, 2026, from AMD's release on Nov 3, 2026, unless stated otherwise. Comparisons are with the same quarter a year earlier. Figures marked as our math are our own calculations.

AMD's data center business nearly doubled in a year. The company's Q3 release shows Data Center segment revenue of $8.5B, up 97% from $4.3B, which AMD credits to EPYC server processors and the launch of its Instinct MI450 GPUs. That was up from $6.7B in Q2, a 27% sequential rise (our math). The segment earned $2.9B of operating income, a margin of about 34% (our math).

Total revenue was a record $13.4B (+45%), above the top of AMD's own guidance, according to CEO Lisa Su. Client processor sales rose 7% to $2.9B and Embedded grew 29% to $1.1B, while Gaming fell 40% to $773M on lower semi-custom and graphics sales. Non-GAAP gross margin was 56%, flat with Q2. Diluted earnings per share were $1.46 on a GAAP basis and $2.09 non-GAAP, up 74% on the non-GAAP measure. The GAAP figure absorbed a $1.1B charge for the change in fair value of warrants AMD has issued to certain customers, a cost that moves with AMD's own share price.

For the December quarter, AMD expects revenue of about $17B, plus or minus 3%. That's roughly 66% growth from a year earlier and 27% from Q3, with non-GAAP gross margin of about 55%. Su said growth should speed up "as we scale Helios and 'Venice' production." Helios is AMD's rack-scale system built on MI450 GPUs and 6th Gen EPYC CPUs, and AMD says Anthropic, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure are already running workloads on the first units.

Cash didn't keep pace with sales. Operating cash flow from continuing operations fell to $1.2B from $1.8B, and free cash flow was $554M, down from $1.5B, a 4% margin. Inventory rose by $3.0B in the quarter to $11.5B, and capital spending was $648M. AMD raised $4.7B of new debt and commercial paper in the quarter and repaid $875M.

Update, Nov. 9, 2026: CNBC reported that Oppenheimer upgraded AMD, with analyst Rick Schafer saying in a Sunday client note that the firm was “raising estimates and upgrading shares of AMD.” Per CNBC, Oppenheimer moved the stock to “outperform” from “perform” and set a $600 price target that CNBC said is 34% above Friday’s $449.04 close. CNBC also said Oppenheimer models 135% data-center revenue growth in 2027, and that AMD shares rose more than 3% in Monday premarket trading. Those rating, target and growth figures are Oppenheimer’s views as reported by CNBC, not Codema’s.

For builders, AMD released ROCm 10, its GPU software stack, and announced deals to acquire model lab World Labs and inference-chip startup Taalas. It also introduced Helion, a reference design for rack-scale systems with a configurable mix of CPUs and GPUs.

AMD's guide sets up the next big chip report. NVIDIA's Q3 FY2027 preview covers what its own data center guidance has to prove. Our explainer on EPS beats and guidance shows how to read a forecast like AMD's, and last month's chip earnings from TSMC, Lam and Texas Instruments showed the same AI demand earlier in the supply chain.