Amazon Web Service, the company’s cloud business, reported revenue of $37.59 billion during the quarter, an increase of 28% from the same quarter last year. This is the fastest growth reported by the division since the second quarter of calendar year 2022. Analysts on Wall Street were working with a growth figure of 26% or $36.64 billion. AWS accounts for nearly a fifth of Amazon’s topline and most of its operating profit.
For the quarter, Amazon’s revenue stood at $181.5 billion, a 17% growth from the previous year, and higher than estimates of $177.2 billion. Earnings Per Share (EPS) of $2.78, was also higher than the estimated $1.64.
Growth in Amazon’s cloud business was driven by higher-than-expected spending by the company to expand its data center capacity. For the 12 months through March 31, Amazon spent $151 billion on property and equipment. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy laid out an ambitious $200 billion spending plan this year, a 56% jump from 2025, mostly on data centers. For the first quarter, Amazon spent $44.2 billion as capex, exceeding estimates. As a result of this increased spending, Amazon’s trailing 12-month free cash flow dropped to $1.2 billion from $25.9 billion earlier.
The company has made investments in both OpenAI and Anthropic in their respective funding rounds, ensuring that the labs commit to spend more than $100 billion on AWS services in the coming years.
E-commerce operations continue to drive bulk of Amazon’s sales, rising 12% to $64.3 billion during the quarter. Advertising revenue increased by 24% to $17.2 billion.
“We’re in the middle of some of the biggest inflections of our lifetime, we’re well positioned to lead, and I’m very optimistic about what’s ahead for our customers and Amazon,” Jassy said in his post earnings remarks to investors.
For the ongoing quarter, Amazon expects sales to range between $194 billion and $199 billion, higher than the $188.9 billion estimate and operating income to be between $20 billion to $24 billion, compared to estimates of $22.65 billion.
Amazon shares are now trading 3.2% higher in extended trade, having ended the regular trading session 1.3% higher. The stock is up 31% in the last one month and is at a 52-week high.
