Global · AI capital
AI cloud backlog: $2.47tn of contracts, and how much rests on two labs
Microsoft, Oracle, Alphabet, Amazon and CoreWeave reported $2.47tn of contracted backlog at mid-2026, 2.1 times the $1.16tn of a year earlier: Microsoft $684bn, Oracle $664bn, Alphabet $520bn (SEC 10-Qs, to 30 Jun 2026; Oracle 31 Aug). At Oracle, Microsoft and Amazon the biggest quarterly jump coincided with a deal with OpenAI or Anthropic.
Updated 11 October 2026 · data build 2026-10-10 · how we know · corrections
$2.47tn of contracted cloud backlog, 2.1× a year earlier
Remaining performance obligations (RPO) at the four hyperscaler cloud sellers and CoreWeave, latest quarter each. Meta sells no cloud and has none. Measured
Source: SEC XBRL RevenueRemainingPerformanceObligation · Amazon 10-Q text (RPO untagged) · 10-Q/10-K lease notes · as of 2026-10-11 · Oracle's quarters (to Aug, Nov, Feb, May) are placed in the calendar quarter they end in · Compiled by StackPath
Company by company: Microsoft and Oracle hold over half of it
Backlog by quarter-end, calendar quarters. Measured
Source: Microsoft (CIK 0000789019) · Oracle (CIK 0001341439) · Alphabet (CIK 0001652044) · Amazon (CIK 0001018724) · CoreWeave (CIK 0001769628) · as of 2026-10-11 · Compiled by StackPath
Amazon stopped tagging RPO in XBRL in 2020; its figures come from the sentence in each 10-Q ("commitments not yet recognized"), which counts only contracts longer than one year and is rounded to the billion.
Backlog against leases and debt: Meta carries the commitments with no backlog behind them
Latest balance for each company. Backlog is revenue to come; unstarted leases and debt are money owed. A rough coverage check, not a margin. Estimate
| Company | Backlog | Unstarted leases | Debt | Backlog ÷ (leases + debt) | As of |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft | $684bn | $329.1bn | $40.3bn | 1.9× | 30 Jun 2026 |
| Amazon | $496bn | $137.2bn | $133bn | 1.8× | 30 Jun 2026 |
| Alphabet | $520bn | $85.2bn | $100.2bn | 2.8× | 30 Jun 2026 |
| Meta | none | $279bn | $83.7bn | 0 | 30 Jun 2026 |
| Oracle | $664bn | $288bn | $125.3bn | 1.6× | 31 Aug 2026 |
| CoreWeave | $104bn | $35.5bn | $35.6bn | 1.5× | 30 Jun 2026 |
Meta signed a further ~$68bn of data-centre leases in July 2026, after the quarter, and has $349.3bn of other non-cancelable commitments, mostly third-party cloud capacity. Meta is a buyer: its backlog is other companies' revenue.
Download CSV ↓Source: SEC XBRL · 10-Q/10-K lease notes · as of 2026-10-11 · Compiled by StackPath
Unstarted leases went from $227bn to $1.12tn in two years
Leases signed but not yet commenced, mostly data centres, as stated in each 10-Q and 10-K (undiscounted future payments). CoreWeave shown for comparison. Measured
Source: Microsoft filings · Amazon filings · Alphabet filings · Meta filings · Oracle filings · CoreWeave filings · as of 2026-10-11 · read from the filing text; no company tags this figure in XBRL · Compiled by StackPath
Microsoft's figure fell through 2024 and early 2025 as leases started (moving onto its balance sheet) faster than new ones were signed, then more than tripled in a year. Oracle's 2024 figures are from a differently worded MD&A sentence ("operating lease commitments"). Microsoft says some FY2026 arrangements are "subject to certain contractual conditions being met".
Oracle expects only 13% of its backlog as revenue in the next year
How much of the backlog each company expects to recognise soon, in its own words. Measured
| Company | Backlog | Expected as revenue | Within | Detail | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft | $684bn | about 30% | 12 months | Share of backlog ($684bn) expected as revenue in the next 12 months; weighted average duration of commercial backlog ~2.3 years | 10-K, 30 Jun 2026 |
| Oracle | $664bn | about 13% | 12 months | Share of backlog ($664bn) expected as revenue in the next 12 months (37% in months 13-36, 34% in months 37-60) | 10-Q, 31 Aug 2026 |
| Alphabet | $519.5bn | just over 50% | 24 months | Share of backlog ($519.5bn, of which Google Cloud $513.9bn) expected as revenue in the next 24 months | 10-Q, 30 Jun 2026 |
Source: Microsoft 10-K · Oracle 10-Q · Alphabet 10-Q · as of 2026-10-11 · Compiled by StackPath
A long backlog means more years in which a customer's finances can change before it pays. Amazon and CoreWeave do not give a comparable twelve-month share in their 10-Qs.
Three of the five sellers' biggest backlog jumps came in the quarter of an OpenAI or Anthropic deal
The largest quarter-on-quarter rise in each seller's backlog, and the deal announced or disclosed in that quarter. Filings rarely name the customer; where they do not, we say so. Our reading
| Company | Quarter | Backlog before | After | Rise | What happened that quarter | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Microsoft | 2025 Q4 | $398bn | $631bn | $233bn | OpenAI committed to buy an incremental $250bn of Azure services on 28 Oct 2025 | reported |
| Oracle | 2025 Q3 | $138bn | $455bn | $318bn | OpenAI's ~$300bn, five-year compute contract was reported the same week (Wall Street Journal); Oracle's filing names no customer | reported |
| Alphabet | 2026 Q1 | $243bn | $468bn | $225bn | The 10-Q names no customer. Anthropic's deal for up to 1m Google TPUs (tens of billions of dollars) was announced the quarter before, in Oct 2025 | inference |
| Amazon | 2026 Q2 | $364bn | $496bn | $132bn | The 10-Q names two expansions: AWS-OpenAI +$100bn over 8 years (Q1 2026) and AWS-Anthropic +>$100bn over 10 years (Q2 2026) | measured |
| CoreWeave | 2026 Q1 | $61bn | $99bn | $38bn | Meta's order of up to ~$21.0bn (Mar 2026), named in the 10-Q | measured |
Source: SEC filings · company announcements and press, as linked · as of 2026-10-11 · Compiled by StackPath
Amazon's backlog rose from $244bn (Dec 2025) to $496bn (Jun 2026), $252bn in two quarters. The same 10-Q names two lab expansions worth at least $200bn together. Microsoft's rose by $233bn in the quarter OpenAI committed $250bn to Azure.
The other side: backlog is a legal commitment, and much of it is ordinary enterprise cloud
Editorial judgement
Backlog is a legal commitment, not a forecast, and it is larger than the leases it supports (2.1×). Microsoft's, Alphabet's and Amazon's backlogs also include ordinary enterprise cloud contracts with thousands of customers. Microsoft and Alphabet could carry their unstarted leases from cash flow even without new contracts (see who pays). The concentration risk is real but specific: Oracle's backlog, which turns slowly, and the share of every seller's backlog that depends on two labs still raising money to pay for it (see lab economics).
What SemiAnalysis says, and what the filings show
Paraphrased from the free section of a SemiAnalysis post. Editorial judgement
Europe: the two European neoclouds' backlogs are mostly US hyperscalers and labs
Reported
| Company | HQ | Backlog | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nscale | GB | $56.4bn | RPO per S-1 condensed financial statements, 30 Jun 2026 (incl. $7.1bn significant financing component). Company TCV metric: $103.4bn active+contracted, of which $2.6bn active, at 31 Aug 2026 |
| Nebius | NL | $37.5bn | RPO per unaudited condensed financial statements (6-K), 30 Jun 2026; letter also cites 'more than $40 billion of customer commitments' |
Source: Nscale filing · Nebius filing · as of 2026-10-11 · European neoclouds dataset · Compiled by StackPath
Nebius's largest contracts are with Microsoft (up to ~$17.4bn, for a New Jersey site) and Meta (up to ~$27bn); Nscale's with Microsoft (up to ~$43.8bn) and Anthropic (up to ~$44.6bn, for a West Virginia campus). These European companies' backlogs are claims on the same US buyers. None of the backlog figures here is split by country, and none of the filers names Ireland.
Our reading. The backlog has grown faster than the buildings: $2.47tn of contracts against $1.12tn of unstarted leases. But it is concentrated. At Oracle, Microsoft and Amazon the biggest single jump came in the quarter of a deal with OpenAI or Anthropic. Those two labs are funded partly by the same companies (see circular deals). The backlog is as good as the labs' ability to keep raising money and growing revenue.
'Leases not yet commenced' are signed leases (mostly data centres) that start later and so are not yet on the balance sheet. Each company states them in words, not tags; we read the sentence in each filing. They are undiscounted future payments, not debt, and some are subject to conditions (Microsoft says so for FY2026). Backlog is remaining performance obligations (RPO): contracted revenue not yet earned. Definitions differ (Amazon counts only contracts longer than a year). Backlog is not cash, and can be cut if customers fail.
Questions people ask
- What is RPO (remaining performance obligations)?
- Revenue a company has signed contracts for but not yet earned: its backlog. For a cloud provider it is mostly multi-year commitments to buy computing capacity. US companies must report it each quarter. It is not cash: it turns into revenue only as the service is delivered.
- How big is the AI cloud backlog?
- $2.47tn at mid-2026 across Microsoft ($684bn), Oracle ($664bn), Alphabet ($519.5bn), Amazon (~$496bn) and CoreWeave ($103.7bn). Not all of it is AI, and definitions differ: Amazon counts only contracts longer than a year (SEC filings).
- How quickly does the backlog turn into revenue?
- Slowly at Oracle: it expects about 13% of its $664bn in the next twelve months. Microsoft expects about 30% of $684bn in twelve months; Alphabet just over 50% of $519.5bn within 24 months (10-Q and 10-K notes).
- Does the backlog cover the data-centre leases?
- In total, yes: the four hyperscaler cloud sellers' backlog of $2.36tn is about 2.1 times the five hyperscalers' $1.12tn of signed, unstarted leases. But Meta has $279bn of such leases and no cloud backlog at all, and much of the backlog depends on a few AI labs paying.