NVIDIA vs AMD Q1 2026: Who Really Won
Earnings?
Meta description: NVIDIA vs AMD Q1 2026 earnings compared — revenue, profit, and margins. See why NVDA is now 8x bigger than AMD and what it means for your portfolio.
Let's be honest — if you've been anywhere near a brokerage app in the last few months, you've probably had the same thought I've had: "Is it too late to buy NVIDIA, and should I just buy AMD instead because it's cheaper?"
I get some version of that question from readers almost every single week. And I don't blame anyone for asking it. Both companies make chips. Both companies are riding the AI wave. Both stocks show up on every "best stocks to buy now USA" list you'll find. So on the surface, it feels like a coin flip — pick your favorite chipmaker and go.
Here's the thing, though. Once the Q1 2026 earnings reports landed for both companies, it became pretty clear that NVIDIA and AMD aren't really playing the same game anymore. One of them is printing money at a scale that's honestly hard to wrap your head around. The other is growing fast, gaining ground, and still very much worth watching — but it's not in the same weight class, at least not yet.
I want to walk you through exactly what happened in these two earnings reports, why the gap is so wide, and what it actually means if you're trying to decide where to put your money in the US stock market today. No jargon-heavy analyst talk. Just a plain breakdown, the way I'd explain it to a friend over coffee.
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A Quick Refresher: Why Everyone's Watching These Two Stocks
Before we get into the numbers, let's set the stage. NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) and AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) are both semiconductor companies, but they've become the poster children of the AI infrastructure boom that's been driving a huge chunk of the S&P 500's gains over the past couple of years.
When Wall Street analysts talk about "AI winners," these two names come up constantly, right alongside Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta — the hyperscalers that are actually buying all these chips to build out data centers. NVIDIA makes the GPUs (graphics processing units) that train and run AI models. AMD makes similar chips, plus a huge lineup of CPUs (the EPYC server chips) and consumer products like Ryzen processors for gaming PCs.
When I first started following semiconductor earnings years ago, I used to lump these two together in my notes as "the GPU guys." These days, that's honestly a disservice to how differently their businesses have evolved. Let's get into why.
NVIDIA's Q1 2026 Revenue: A Number That's Hard to Believe
NVIDIA reported first-quarter revenue of $81.6 billion, which was up 85% from the same quarter a year earlier. Let that sink in for a second — a company generating over $80 billion in three months. To put that in perspective, that's more than the annual GDP of some entire countries, generated in a single quarter.
I want to clear up something quickly, because I've seen a lot of confusion floating around online about this report. Some write-ups have thrown around a "210% growth" figure for NVIDIA's revenue, but that's actually mixing up two different numbers. Revenue itself grew 85% year-over-year. The number that jumped over 210% was NVIDIA's net income — which we'll get to in a second. It's an easy mix-up to make, but the distinction matters if you're trying to understand what's actually driving the stock.
The engine behind almost all of this growth is NVIDIA's Data Center segment, which pulled in $75.2 billion on its own — up 92% year-over-year. That single business line is now bigger than AMD's entire company, several times over. Demand for NVIDIA's Blackwell architecture chips, which power the current wave of large language models and agentic AI systems, has been described by CEO Jensen Huang as "the largest infrastructure expansion in human history." That's a bold quote, but the revenue numbers back it up.
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AMD's Q1 2026 Revenue: Solid Growth, Smaller Scale
AMD's numbers tell a different story, but honestly, not a bad one. Revenue came in at $10.3 billion for the quarter, up 38% from a year ago. If you pulled this number out of context and showed it to me without telling me who it belonged to, I'd call it a great quarter — 38% growth doesn't happen by accident, and it came in ahead of what Wall Street was expecting.
The real story inside AMD's numbers is the Data Center segment, which came in at $5.8 billion, up 57% year-over-year. For the first time, Data Center revenue made up more than half of AMD's total business, driven by demand for its EPYC server CPUs and Instinct MI350 series AI GPUs. That's a meaningful shift for a company that, not too long ago, still leaned heavily on gaming and PC chips (the Client and Gaming segment) for a big chunk of its revenue.
So here's the honest comparison: NVIDIA's Q1 revenue was roughly 8 times larger than AMD's. That's not a knock on AMD — it's just the reality of where each company sits in the AI chip race right now.
Net Income: This Is Where the Gap Really Opens Up
Revenue tells you how much money is coming in the door. Net income tells you how much of that actually turns into profit. And this is where the difference between these two companies becomes almost jaw-dropping.
NVIDIA's net income for the quarter came in at $58.3 billion, up 211% from the year-ago period. Read that again — NVIDIA turned more than 70 cents of every revenue dollar into bottom-line profit. That's an extraordinary conversion rate for any company, let alone one operating at this scale.
AMD's net income, by comparison, was $1.4 billion on a GAAP basis (or $2.3 billion on a non-GAAP basis, which strips out certain one-time costs like stock-based compensation). AMD's profit was up about 95% year-over-year, which is genuinely strong growth — it basically doubled. But here's the kicker: NVIDIA's net income alone ($58.3 billion) is more than five times bigger than AMD's entire quarterly revenue ($10.3 billion). That's the kind of stat that really puts the scale difference in perspective.
When I first started writing about earnings season years ago, I made the mistake of assuming that if two companies were "growing profit at a similar percentage," they were performing similarly. AMD's profit growth (95%) actually isn't far off from NVIDIA's revenue growth rate (85%) — but because NVIDIA's base is so much bigger, the dollar gap between them just keeps widening every quarter.
Gross Margins: Who Has More Pricing Power?
Gross margin is basically a measure of how much a company keeps after covering the direct cost of making its product. It's one of the best ways to see who has real pricing power in a market.
NVIDIA posted a gross margin of roughly 74.9% to 75% for the quarter. That's an exceptional number for a hardware company — most chipmakers would kill for margins like that. It tells you that customers (hyperscalers like Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Meta) are willing to pay a serious premium for NVIDIA's chips because, frankly, there aren't many alternatives that can match their performance for AI training and inference workloads right now.
AMD's gross margin came in at about 53% GAAP / 55% non-GAAP. That's still a healthy, respectable margin for a semiconductor company — plenty of chipmakers would be happy with numbers like that. But it's noticeably lower than NVIDIA's, partly because AMD's business mix still includes lower-margin consumer products like Ryzen gaming chips alongside its higher-margin Data Center business.
Here's a simple way to think about it: NVIDIA is selling something closer to a luxury good in the AI hardware world — high demand, limited competition, premium pricing. AMD is selling excellent products too, but it's competing on a mix of value and performance across a broader range of customers.
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Why the Scale Gap Matters for Investors
Now you might be wondering: does this mean NVIDIA is automatically the better stock to buy? Not necessarily — and this is where I want to push back a little on the "just buy the biggest number" instinct.
NVIDIA's valuation already reflects a huge amount of optimism about continued AI dominance. When a stock trades at a premium multiple, it's pricing in years of above-average growth. If that growth ever slows — even to something that would be considered "great" for most companies — the stock can react negatively simply because it didn't meet sky-high expectations. We actually saw a bit of this after the Q1 report; despite blowout numbers, NVDA shares saw only modest movement because the results, while excellent, were already largely expected by Wall Street.
AMD, on the other hand, is often framed as the "value" or "catch-up" play in AI infrastructure. It trades at a lower multiple relative to its growth rate compared to NVIDIA, and every quarter where AMD's Data Center segment grows 50%+ year-over-year chips away (pun intended) at the narrative that it's permanently behind. Some investors like this setup because there's more room for AMD to surprise to the upside if it keeps gaining market share.
US Stock Market Context: The Bigger AI Picture
It's worth zooming out for a second, because neither of these earnings reports happened in a vacuum. The US stock market has been leaning heavily on AI-related capital expenditure over the past couple of years. Fed rate decisions, inflation reports, and jobs data all still matter for the broader Nasdaq and S&P 500, but a huge share of recent market gains has come specifically from hyperscalers pouring money into AI infrastructure — the exact spending that shows up as revenue for NVIDIA and AMD.
That's part of why earnings season for these two companies gets so much attention on Wall Street. When NVIDIA guides for $91 billion in next-quarter revenue, or AMD guides for $11.2 billion, those numbers ripple out into how analysts think about capital spending trends across the entire tech sector — and by extension, how comfortable people feel about the US stock market today more broadly.
Future Outlook: Guidance and Analyst Price Targets
So where do these two stocks go from here? Let's look at both the companies' own guidance and what Wall Street analysts are currently projecting — keeping in mind that price targets shift constantly and are never a guarantee.
NVIDIA's forward guidance: Management guided for roughly $91 billion in Q2 fiscal 2027 revenue, plus or minus 2% — which would mark another sequential record if it holds. That guidance notably assumes zero Data Center compute revenue from China, meaning there's actually some upside if export restrictions ever ease. As of mid-July 2026, Wall Street's average 12-month price target for NVDA clusters in the $275 to $310 range, according to compiled analyst data from sources like TipRanks and StockAnalysis, with a "Strong Buy" consensus rating from the majority of covering analysts. Individual targets vary widely, from the mid-$200s on the conservative end up to $500 from some of the more bullish shops — a reminder of just how much disagreement exists over how long this growth cycle can run.
AMD's forward guidance: AMD guided for roughly $11.2 billion in Q2 2026 revenue, implying around 46% year-over-year growth, with management pointing to server CPU revenue growing more than 70% year-over-year next quarter. Longer-term, AMD has raised its own forecast for the total server CPU market to over $120 billion by 2030, and it's targeting more than 50% share of that market. On the analyst side, price targets for AMD have moved up sharply since the Q1 report — several major firms (Bernstein, Barclays, Cantor Fitzgerald, BofA) raised targets into the $450 to $525 range shortly after earnings, citing AMD's expanding AI GPU partnerships with companies like Meta and OpenAI. Because AMD's stock price itself has rallied hard over the past few months, some of these targets now sit close to — or even below — where the stock is actually trading, which is Wall Street's way of saying the "easy" re-rating may already be priced in.
The bigger-picture takeaway: both companies are guiding for continued growth into the back half of 2026, and analysts remain broadly bullish on both names. But the dispersion in price targets — especially for AMD, where forecasts range from the $400s to over $600 — tells you there's real uncertainty about how much of this AI growth story is already baked into today's share prices. Targets like these get revised every earnings season, so treat any specific number as a snapshot in time rather than a promise of where the stock is headed.
Which Stock Could Deliver Bigger Returns Next Year?
This is genuinely one of the trickiest questions to answer, because NVIDIA and AMD have very different setups right now. Let's break it down plainly.
The growth case for AMD: Revenue growth was 38% year-over-year for AMD versus 85% for NVIDIA — but AMD is working off a much smaller base, which makes big percentage gains easier to come by. Net income is already up 95% year-over-year, and AMD's Data Center segment grew 57% year-over-year. Analyst price targets have also jumped sharply after the Q1 report, moving into the $450–$525 range following new GPU deals with companies like Meta and OpenAI. If AMD executes well on its MI450 and Helios ramp in the second half of 2026, the upside could be substantial, since the market is still pricing AMD as a company gaining market share rather than one that's already dominant.
The stability case for NVIDIA: NVIDIA generated $58.3 billion in quarterly profit with a 75% gross margin — a scale no competitor can currently match. That makes NVIDIA more predictable, with less execution risk, since it's already the dominant player in AI chips. The tradeoff is that a lot of future growth is already priced into the stock, so the percentage upside from here may be smaller simply because the starting base is so much bigger.
The honest answer: Purely from a percentage-return standpoint, AMD's theoretical upside looks larger — it's a smaller company with faster growth, and the market is still treating it as a "catch-up story." But that comes with more risk too. If the MI450 ramp slows down or a major customer deal falls through, the stock could fall just as fast as it's risen — some reports have AMD trading at a stretched valuation (137x P/E) after its recent rally. NVIDIA represents more of a "safe growth" bet — less dramatic upside, but also less execution risk.
No one can reliably predict which stock will deliver a bigger return next year — it depends heavily on how long the AI capex cycle continues, on execution at both companies, and on macro factors like Fed rate decisions and China export policy. This isn't investment advice — do your own research and talk to a licensed financial advisor before making any big decisions.
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NVDA and AMD: Key Support and Resistance Levels
If you're more of a chart-watcher than a fundamentals-only investor, here's where both stocks stood technically as of mid-July 2026. Keep in mind these levels shift constantly as new price action forms, so treat this as a snapshot rather than something fixed.
NVIDIA (NVDA): Shares were trading in the $200–$211 range, with the stock sitting well below its 52-week high of $236.54 and comfortably above its 52-week low of $162.02. On the technical side, NVDA has been running into resistance in the $204–$212.50 zone, an area that's formed a bit of a "double top" pattern where buyers have repeatedly failed to push through. On the downside, near-term support sits around $198–$193, with a deeper support zone closer to $187 if that level breaks. A confirmed move above $212.50 would open the door toward a retest of the all-time high, while a break below $193 could see the stock drift toward the $184–$187 area.
AMD: Shares were trading in the $520–$550 range after a massive run-up over the past year, with a 52-week high of $584.73 and a 52-week low of just $141.91 — a reminder of just how far the stock has climbed. AMD has been finding resistance around $540–$546.50, a level that lines up with a recent swing high, while immediate support sits around $520–$522, backed by a deeper support zone near $495–$500 if the stock pulls back further. A sustained break above $546.50 would likely fuel continued bullish momentum, while a slide below $495 would be the first real sign that the rally is losing steam.
Worth remembering: technical levels like these are most useful for short-term trading decisions, not long-term investing calls. Both stocks are volatile enough that these zones can shift within days, especially heading into their next earnings reports (AMD is expected to report Q2 results in early August 2026, with NVIDIA's fiscal Q2 report following later that month).
Risks Worth Knowing About Before You Invest
I'd be doing you a disservice if I only talked about the good stuff, so let's talk risk for a second.
For NVIDIA, the biggest risks are valuation and concentration. A huge share of its revenue depends on a relatively small number of massive customers (the hyperscalers), and any slowdown in their AI capital spending could hit NVIDIA's growth rate hard. There's also ongoing uncertainty around export restrictions to China, which have already impacted prior quarters and remain a wildcard.
For AMD, the risk is more about execution and market share. AMD still trails NVIDIA significantly in AI GPU market share, and it needs its upcoming Instinct GPU generations to keep gaining traction with major cloud customers. There's also more competitive pressure in AMD's traditional PC and gaming chip business, which doesn't carry the same growth story as Data Center.
Neither stock is risk-free, and past performance — even a spectacular quarter like this one — is never a guarantee of what happens next.
My Take: Two Different Stocks for Two Different Goals
If you're looking at these two purely as "which company is bigger and more profitable right now," NVIDIA wins in a landslide. It's not really a debate. NVIDIA has become what I'd call a cash-generating monster — a company so dominant in its niche that it's now setting the pace for capital spending across the entire AI industry.
But if you're thinking about where the next leg of growth might come from, AMD's story is genuinely interesting too. A company growing Data Center revenue 57% year-over-year, with management raising long-term server CPU forecasts and landing major AI partnerships, isn't just riding NVIDIA's coattails — it's carving out real share in a market that's still expanding rapidly.
Personally, I don't think this has to be an either/or decision for most long-term investors. Plenty of people hold both, treating NVIDIA as the AI infrastructure blue chip and AMD as the higher-upside challenger play. What matters most is understanding what you actually own and why — not just chasing whichever stock had the flashier headline last week.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is NVIDIA stock overvalued after Q1 2026 earnings?
NVIDIA trades at a premium valuation that assumes continued strong AI-related growth. Whether that's "overvalued" depends on your view of how long the AI infrastructure buildout continues. It's not a call any blog post can make for you — it depends on your own risk tolerance and time horizon.
Why is AMD's profit so much smaller than NVIDIA's if its revenue growth is strong?
AMD's revenue base is still much smaller than NVIDIA's, and its business mix includes lower-margin consumer products alongside its faster-growing, higher-margin Data Center segment. Both factors keep AMD's net income well below NVIDIA's, even with strong percentage growth.
Should beginners buy NVIDIA or AMD stock first?
There's no single right answer here. Some beginners prefer NVIDIA for its scale and dominant market position, while others prefer AMD for its lower share price and perceived room to grow. If you're new to investing in US stocks, it's worth researching both thoroughly — or considering a diversified fund that holds a broad basket of tech names — before picking individual stocks.
How often do NVIDIA and AMD report earnings?
Both companies report quarterly earnings, roughly every three months, in line with SEC reporting requirements for US publicly traded companies. NVIDIA's fiscal year is offset from the calendar year, so its "Q1" results are typically reported in May.
What is NVIDIA's gross margin compared to AMD's?
NVIDIA's gross margin was around 74.9% to 75% in Q1 2026, compared to AMD's roughly 53% GAAP (55% non-GAAP). This reflects NVIDIA's stronger pricing power in the AI GPU market.
Where can I find official NVIDIA and AMD earnings reports?
Both companies publish their quarterly results through SEC filings (available on the SEC's EDGAR database) and on their own investor relations websites, which is the most reliable place to check the raw numbers yourself rather than relying solely on secondhand summaries.
Final Thoughts
At the end of the day, comparing NVIDIA and AMD's Q1 2026 earnings isn't really about picking a "winner" in some abstract sense — it's about understanding what stage each company is at and how that fits into your own investing goals. NVIDIA has built an extraordinary profit machine that's currently unmatched in the semiconductor world. AMD is a fast-growing challenger putting up real numbers and closing the gap in specific areas, even if the overall scale still isn't close.
Whichever way you lean, the smartest move is always the same: look past the headlines, read the actual numbers, and make sure whatever you buy fits your own strategy — not just the stock everyone's talking about this week.
How $500 a Month Could Grow Into $500,000 Over Time
Disclaimer:
This blog is for educational and informational purposes only. The views expressed here are general information and should not be considered financial or investment advice. Investing in the stock market involves risk, and you should consult a licensed financial advisor (SEC-registered where applicable) before making any investment decisions. The author and website are not responsible for any financial losses incurred.
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