SpaceX tops Q3 estimates as revenue surges 161% on Starlink, AI compute expansion

Investing.com -- SpaceX reported Q3 revenue of $14.6 billion, easily beating Wall Street consensus estimates of $12.87 billion, driven by 161% year-over-year top-line growth. The company posted adjusted earnings per share of $0.35—more than double the $0.15 consensus estimate—while net income surged to $4.4 billion, well ahead of the expected $1.88 billion.

SpaceX shares jumped 7.3% in afterhours trade to $158.68.

Top-line growth was anchored by the company’s Super Intelligence (SI) division, which generated $7.6 billion in revenue against expectations of $6.3 billion.

SpaceX had signed agreements with Antrhopic and Google to supply computing power from its Collosus II data center, which were major revenue streams for the company and a monetization of its xAI acquisition from earlier in the year.

The Connectivity segment contributed $5.2 billion (vs. $4.9 billion estimated), fueled by accelerating Starlink consumer adoption and expanding enterprise and government contracts. Space segment revenue reached $1.8 billion, exceeding the $1.43 billion target.

"As crazy as this sounds, $1T in SpaceX revenue in 2028 is no longer impossible," CEO Elon Musk said in a social media post following the earnings.

Musk also flagged the possibility of merging SpaceX and Tesla, stating that each company had established special independent committees to explore a potential merger.

Adjusted EBITDA climbed 306% year-over-year to $8.8 billion, comfortably outperforming the $6.59 billion estimate. Operating income reached $2.8 billion—up from a $273 million loss in Q3 2025—beating forecasts of $2.24 billion. Connectivity operating income rose 99% year-over-year to $2.4 billion.

Key operational milestones included the first revenue-generating Starship payload, which successfully deployed 26 Starlink V3 satellites—delivering roughly ten times the downlink capacity per launch compared to Falcon 9.

Capital expenditures for the quarter totaled $19.6 billion, matching expectations. $16.4 billion was directed toward scaling compute infrastructure within the SI segment, expanding nameplate compute capacity to 1.7 GW as of September 30, 2026.

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