Cerebras Systems Q1 2026 Earnings Overview
Cerebras Systems reported first‑quarter 2026 revenue of $193.4 million, surpassing analysts’ estimate of $180.8 million, representing a 94 % year‑over‑year increase and a 13 % sequential rise. GAAP net loss for the quarter was $14.0 million, while on a non‑GAAP basis the loss narrowed to $2.5 million, resulting in earnings of $0.22 per share versus the consensus expectation of a $0.16 loss per share.
The company’s shares closed the regular session at $226.72, up 1.02 %, but fell to approximately $209.99 in after‑hours trading, a decline of about 9 % following the earnings release.
Cerebras highlighted two multi‑year partnership announcements. It disclosed a deal with OpenAI valued at more than $20 billion, covering 750 megawatts of high‑speed inference compute and the co‑launch of the Codex‑Spark model delivering over 1,000 tokens per second. It also announced a partnership with Amazon Web Services to combine AWS Trainium 3 chips for pre‑fill with Cerebras CS‑3 systems for decode, extending fast inference globally.
Guidance for the full year 2026 was set at $855 million to $865 million of core revenue, implying roughly 69 % year‑over‑year growth at the midpoint. However, the company warned that Q2 2026 core gross margin is expected to be 36 % to 38 %, a compression from the 47 % core gross margin reported in Q1.
Analyst sentiment prior to the release was broadly constructive, with Wedbush maintaining an Outperform rating and a $270 price target, while Craig‑Hallum, Needham, Rosenblatt and Mizuho issued Buy‑equivalent ratings with price targets ranging from $300 to $325. Short interest stood at 17.15 % of float as of May 29 2026.
The results are the company’s first since completing what it billed as the largest semiconductor IPO of all time in May 2026, pricing shares at $185 and raising $6.4 billion on the Nasdaq. Cerebras ended Q1 with $3.3 billion in cash, equivalents, restricted cash, and short‑term investments, providing a substantial war chest as it scales its wafer‑scale AI accelerator business.
The next earnings release is scheduled for September 2 2026, which will provide the first full‑quarter view of revenue from the OpenAI and AWS partnerships and indicate whether the anticipated gross‑margin compression is temporary.