Citi Research has increased its revenue projections for AI services for the period from 2026 to 2028. The bank attributes these adjustments to rising demand and improved monetization strategies among major cloud providers, including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, Google Cloud, and Meta.
The updated forecasts show revenue estimate increases of 9% for 2026, 7% for 2027, and 17% for 2028. These four hyperscalers reported a combined 25% year-over-year revenue growth in the third quarter of 2026, with the top three providers seeing growth accelerate to 56%.
Specific metrics highlight this growth: Google Cloud now serves 2,600 customers consuming over 100 billion tokens, up from 2,000 in the second quarter. Meanwhile, Microsoft 365 Copilot saw consumption-based billing growth exceed 75% quarter over quarter, and Amazon projects AWS growth to surpass 40% in fiscal 2027 and 2028.
Citi also estimates that global AI capital expenditures will reach $1,68 trillion in 2027, representing a 64% increase from 2026. Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Meta are expected to account for approximately 64% of this total expenditure.
These revisions build upon the bank's March 2026 projection, which estimated long-term AI capital expenditures and revenue at $8,9 trillion for the 2026 to 2030 period.
