AWS revenue continues to soar as cloud demand remains high

Amazon Web Services (AWS) concluded 2025 with its most impressive quarterly growth in over three years. In a report released on Thursday, the company revealed that its cloud service division generated $35.6 billion in revenue during the fourth quarter of 2025. This represents a remarkable 24% increase compared to the same quarter last year, marking the segment's highest growth rate in 13 quarters. According to Amazon, the annual revenue run rate for AWS now stands at $142 billion. Notably, AWS's operating income rose to $12.5 billion in the fourth quarter, up from $10.6 billion in the same period last year. During the fourth-quarter earnings call, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy emphasized the significance of this growth, stating, "Having a 24% year-over-year growth on a $142 billion annualized run rate is different than achieving higher percentage growth on a smaller base, as seen with our competitors." He asserted that AWS continues to generate more revenue and capacity than its rivals, solidifying its leadership in the cloud market. The fourth quarter's growth was propelled by new partnerships with major organizations such as Salesforce, BlackRock, Perplexity, and the U.S. Air Force. Jassy noted that a greater number of the top 500 U.S. startups rely on AWS as their primary cloud service provider than the next two competitors combined. Additionally, AWS expanded its data center network by adding over a gigawatt of power in this quarter. As enterprises increasingly transition their infrastructure from on-premises to the cloud, AWS continues to see significant business from this sector. The company is also benefiting from the ongoing AI boom, with Jassy highlighting the comprehensive AI stack functionality AWS provides. He mentioned, "Customers are keen to run their AI workloads alongside their other applications and data on AWS." As clients execute large AI workloads, they are also increasing their core AWS usage. Despite AWS's robust performance, Amazon's stock saw a 10% decline in after-hours trading due to investor concerns over the company's plans for increased capital expenditures and a shortfall in earnings per share expectations.