It is the IPO half the tech world is waiting for: OpenAI filed a confidential S-1 with the SEC on June 8, 2026. That makes it clear the company behind ChatGPT wants to go public in 2026. Its last valuation was $852 billion, and estimates of up to around $1 trillion are circulating for the IPO.
I follow OpenAI not just because I use ChatGPT every day, but because one of the most valuable private technology companies in the world is going public. Unlike SpaceX, which is already listed, OpenAI is still a private company until the IPO. So you cannot buy the stock yet, and there is no separate ChatGPT stock either.
In this article you get everything about the OpenAI IPO: the expected date, the valuation, the business model behind the revenue, the biggest investors and the routes available before the IPO if you want to invest.
- OpenAI filed a confidential S-1 with the SEC on June 8, 2026, with the IPO expected in Q3/Q4 2026
- Its last valuation is $852 billion (March 2026), and up to around $1 trillion is being discussed for the IPO
- Annualized revenue is around $24 billion (run-rate March 2026), the fastest revenue growth in tech history
- Its structure as a Public Benefit Corporation under a nonprofit parent makes the IPO more complicated than for a normal company
1. The OpenAI IPO at a glance
The key facts of the planned offering:
Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| S-1 filed | June 8, 2026 (confidential) |
| Expected IPO | Q3/Q4 2026 (from September) |
| Underwriters | Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley |
| Last valuation | $852B (March 2026) |
| Expected IPO valuation | up to ~$1T |
| Largest round | $122B (March 2026) |
| Ticker | not yet set |
| Stock tradable | only after the IPO |
The key difference from a normal IPO: OpenAI is organized today as a Public Benefit Corporation that is controlled by a nonprofit foundation. This setup makes the offering legally far more complex than a classic company going public. More on that further down.
2. The road to the IPO
OpenAI was founded in 2015 as a non-profit with the goal of making artificial intelligence benefit all of humanity. In ten years, that non-profit has become one of the most valuable private tech companies in the world. The timeline below shows the key stations up to the S-1:
The real accelerator was the funding round in March 2026: with $122 billion in fresh capital and a valuation of $852 billion, going public became the obvious next step. Less than ten weeks later came the confidential S-1 on June 8, 2026.
3. Valuation: $852 billion and how it got there
Few private technology companies have ever posted a comparable valuation trajectory, from $1 billion in 2019 to $852 billion in March 2026. The chart below shows the rise across the individual funding rounds:
The jumps are enormous: $14 billion in 2021, $29 billion in 2023, $86 billion in early 2024, $157 billion in October 2024, $300 billion in March 2025 and $500 billion in October 2025. The March 2026 round was announced at a pre-money of $730 billion and finalized at $852 billion post-money. For context: measured against annualized revenue of around $24 billion, that is a multiple that prices in a lot of future growth. You can find more numbers in my article on OpenAI statistics.
4. Funding & investors
In total, OpenAI has raised around $190 billion in funding. The biggest backers are SoftBank, Amazon, Nvidia and Microsoft. The chart below shows the most important investors by amount invested:
SoftBank is the biggest backer with over $71 billion in total. In the March 2026 round, Amazon committed $50 billion and Nvidia $30 billion, while Microsoft has been on board with $13 billion since 2019. At $122 billion, this round is the largest single funding round in the history of private companies. What stands out is how tightly OpenAI is now intertwined with its compute partners: Nvidia supplies the chips, Amazon and Microsoft the cloud infrastructure.
5. Revenue & business model
OpenAI makes its money from three pillars: ChatGPT subscriptions for consumers, the API for developers and enterprise contracts with companies. Annualized revenue has grown like nothing in tech history, from around $0.3 billion at the end of 2022 to around $24 billion run-rate in March 2026:
The curve speaks for itself. From around $0.3 billion at the end of 2022 it went to $2 billion (2023), $6 billion (2024) and $13 billion in mid-2025, then over $20 billion at the end of 2025 and around $24 billion annualized in March 2026. One detail matters for investors. There is no separate ChatGPT stock. Anyone who wants to bet on ChatGPT's growth gets that exposure only through OpenAI stock after the IPO. And despite the growth, OpenAI is not yet sustainably profitable, as its infrastructure and staffing costs are enormous.
6. The numbers behind the IPO: a $38.5B loss
On June 16, 2026, OpenAI's audited 2025 figures became public. On revenue of $13.07 billion, it posted an operating loss of $20.9 billion. The reported net loss of $38.5 billion, however, is inflated by a one-time, non-cash conversion effect of $41.5 billion from the for-profit restructuring.
Metric | 2025 |
|---|---|
| Revenue 2025 | $13.07B |
| Operating loss | $20.9B |
| Net loss | $38.5B |
| of which one-time (recap) | $41.5B |
| Adjusted cash loss | ~$8B |
Stripped of one-off items, the actual cash loss was around $8 billion. The biggest cost block was research and development at $19.18 billion. For investors that means the huge net loss is largely an accounting effect, while the operating hole is real but far smaller.
7. The $1.4 trillion compute deals
OpenAI has signed compute contracts worth around $1.4 trillion, with Broadcom ($350 billion), Oracle ($300 billion) and Microsoft ($250 billion) alone. On top of that come Nvidia ($100 billion), AMD ($90 billion), Amazon AWS ($38 billion) and CoreWeave ($22 billion).
That exceeds today's revenue by more than fiftyfold and is the real reason for OpenAI's hunger for capital and its planned IPO. The per-partner figures, though, are reported estimates rather than fixed amounts.
8. Who owns OpenAI?
After the conversion into a Public Benefit Corporation in October 2025, employees and investors hold 47 %, Microsoft 27 % (around $135 billion) and the nonprofit OpenAI Foundation 26 %.
Microsoft diluted its stake from a previous 32.5 % to 27 %, but keeps the IP rights to the frontier models through 2032. For future shareholders, that is the decisive point: the nonprofit foundation remains the largest controlling block with just over a quarter.
9. When will OpenAI go public?
OpenAI took the first formal step with the confidential S-1 on June 8, 2026. "Confidential" means the filing initially goes only to the SEC, not the public. Typically the public version of the S-1 follows around 60 to 90 days later, in this case roughly late July or August. Only then does the roadshow begin, where management pitches institutional investors on the stock.
The actual IPO is expected in the second half of 2026, so Q3 or Q4. It is led by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as the lead banks. There is no fixed date yet.
One peculiarity could affect the timeline: OpenAI is organized as a Public Benefit Corporation that is formally controlled by a nonprofit foundation. This structure is unusual for an IPO and raises questions, such as how much say new shareholders actually get and how the nonprofit parent keeps control. Such constructions are complex to structure and can lengthen the process.
10. Buying OpenAI stock: routes before the IPO
The honest answer first: you cannot buy OpenAI stock the normal way right now. As long as the company is private, there is no freely tradable stock and no separate ChatGPT stock either. But there are a few ways to prepare or get indirect exposure:
Route | Access | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Wait for the IPO | from Q3/Q4 2026 via any US broker | simplest route |
| Secondary markets (Forge, EquityZen) | accredited investors only | high minimums |
| Funds with a stake | indirectly via some tech/VC funds | small, indirect share |
By far the simplest route, and the sensible one for most people, is to simply wait for the IPO. Once the stock is listed, you buy it through any broker that offers US equities. There is currently no WKN or ISIN, as both identifiers are only assigned at the IPO. Steer clear of shady offers that try to sell you "OpenAI shares" today.
11. SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI: the three big IPOs compared
OpenAI is not the only mega-IPO this year. With SpaceX and Anthropic, two more of the most valuable tech and AI companies are heading for, or already past, the public markets. Here is how OpenAI ranks by valuation:
gradually.aiCompany | Valuation | Revenue/ARR | IPO status | Ticker |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SpaceX | $1.75T | $18.7B (2025) | Listed 06/12/2026 | SPCX |
| Anthropic | $965B | ~$47B ARR | S-1 June 1, target Oct 2026 | TBD |
| OpenAI | $852B | ~$24B ARR | S-1 June 8, Q3/Q4 2026 | TBD |
SpaceX is by far the largest of the three and the only one already listed. OpenAI and Anthropic sit close together at $852 billion and $965 billion and both filed their IPO paperwork confidentially in early June. For details on the other two, see my articles on the SpaceX IPO and the Anthropic IPO.
12. Risks for investors
As exciting as the OpenAI IPO is, the stock will be no sure thing. These points are worth knowing:
- Extreme valuation: $852 billion against around $24 billion in revenue leaves little room for disappointment. A lot of future growth is already priced in.
- Heavy cash burn: Despite record revenue, OpenAI is not yet sustainably profitable. Its spending on compute and staff is huge.
- Governance and structure: The Public Benefit Corporation under a nonprofit parent is unfamiliar to shareholders and limits their say.
- Strong competition: Anthropic has overtaken OpenAI on valuation, and Google is pushing hard into the market with Gemini.
- Dependence on partners: OpenAI relies heavily on Microsoft, Nvidia and Amazon for capital and compute. That is a concentration risk.
- IPO timing: There is no fixed date. If the listing slips or the market cools, the valuation can change too.
My take: the OpenAI IPO will be one of the largest in history, and the company sits at the center of the AI revolution. But the valuation assumes that OpenAI keeps its lead and eventually turns profitable. Anyone getting in should know the risks and only invest money they can afford to lose. This is not investment advice, just context.
