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Hyperscaler AI capex: from $226B to a guided $725B in two years

Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft spent a combined $226 billion on capital expenditure in 2024 and $410 billion in 2025, and are now guiding to $725 billion in 2026, a 77 percent jump confirmed across their latest earnings calls. The AI buildout is still accelerating even as questions about the return on that spending intensify.

Combined capex, Amazon + Alphabet + Meta + Microsoft, $ billions per month (reconstructed)
01530456075202420252026Jan 2026: guidance jumps 77% for the year$59.5B

Source: Company capital-expenditure disclosures and 2026 guidance for Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft, as reported in Q1–Q2 2026 earnings coverage (CNBC, Tom's Hardware, Yahoo Finance), January 2024 through June 2026.

Monthly figures are reconstructed to sum to each year's reported total: $226 billion in 2024 and $410 billion in 2025 are company actuals, while $725 billion in 2026 is guidance issued during Q1–Q2 2026 earnings, not yet a full-year actual. The four companies do not report capex on a synchronized monthly or fully aligned quarterly basis, so the within-year shape is approximated as a smooth ramp consistent with the quarter-over-quarter acceleration each has disclosed.

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