OpenAI resets spend expectations, targets around $600 billion by 2030

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is seen in Berlin on September 25, 2025.
Florian Gaertner | Phototech | Getty Images
OpenAI is telling investors it’s targeting about $600 billion in total computing spending by 2030, months after CEO Sam Altman promised $1.4 trillion in infrastructure commitments.
Sources told CNBC that the AI company provided a lower figure and a more defined timeline for its planned spending amid growing broader concerns that expansion targets are too large for potential future revenue.
OpenAI estimates its total revenue for 2030 will be more than $280 billion, with almost equal contributions from consumer and enterprise businesses, said the sources, who asked not to be named because the information is confidential. The spending plan the company is presenting aims to tie more directly to expected revenue growth, the sources said.
In the back half of last year, OpenAI announced multibillion-dollar infrastructure deals by partnering with leading chipmakers and cloud companies.
OpenAI has closed a massive funding round that could total more than $100 billion, with about 90% of that coming from strategic investors, one person said. CNBC has confirmed that Nvidia is in talks to invest up to $30 billion in OpenAI as part of a round that could give the company a pre-money valuation of $730 billion.
In addition to Nvidia, the fund’s strategic investors include SoftBank and Amazon.
Sources said OpenAI generated $13.1 billion in revenue in 2025, out of its $10 billion target. They said the company burned $8 billion, below its $9 billion target.
The startup was founded in 2015 as a non-profit research lab and quickly became mainstream following the launch of its chatbot ChatGPT in 2022. According to sources, ChatGPT currently supports more than 900 million weekly active users. This number was 800 million as of October.
OpenAI declared a “code red” in December to focus on developing its chatbot in the face of competition from rivals Google and Anthropic. Sources said ChatGPT experienced a dip in growth in the fall but is back to record levels in both weekly active and daily active users.
The company’s coding product, Codex, has surpassed more than 1.5 million weekly active users, sources said. Codex is in direct competition with Anthropic’s Claude Rules, which saw a wave of adoption last year.
WRISTWATCH: Watch CNBC’s full interview with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman




