Exclusive: Here's How Much OpenAI Spends On Inference And Its MSFT Revenue Share

Better Offline

In a Better Offline exclusive, Ed Zitron reveals how much OpenAI spent on inference in 2024 and 2025, as well as how much it paid Microsoft as part of its 20% revenue share. Inference costs are much higher - and implied revenues much lower - than previously reported.

(Free) Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/oai_docs/

The Information - OpenAI’s First Half Results: $4.3 Billion in Sales, $2.5 Billion Cash Burn - https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openais-first-half-results-4-3-billion-sales-2-5-billion-cash-burn?rc=kz8jh3 

The Information (reference to $6bn inference spend) - http://theinformation.com/articles/openai-forecasts-revenue-topping-125-billion-2029-agents-new-products-gain?rc=kz8jh3

Want to support me? Get $10 off a year’s subscription to my premium newsletter: https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/w08jbm4jwg it would mean a lot!

YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.

---

LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks

Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/

Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ 

Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at

Ed's Socials:

https://twitter.com/edzitron

https://www.instagram.com/edzitron

https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com

https://www.threads.net/@edzitron

Email Me: ez@betteroffline.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

More description

In a Better Offline exclusive, Ed Zitron reveals how much OpenAI spent on inference in 2024 and 2025, as well as how much it paid Microsoft as part of its 20% revenue share. Inference costs are much higher - and implied revenues much lower - than previously reported.

(Free) Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/oai_docs/

The Information - OpenAI’s First Half Results: $4.3 Billion in Sales, $2.5 Billion Cash Burn - https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openais-first-half-results-4-3-billion-sales-2-5-billion-cash-burn?rc=kz8jh3 

The Information (reference to $6bn inference spend) - http://theinformation.com/articles/openai-forecasts-revenue-topping-125-billion-2029-agents-new-products-gain?rc=kz8jh3

Want to support me? Get $10 off a year’s subscription to my premium newsletter: https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/w08jbm4jwg it would mean a lot!

YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.

---

LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks

Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/

Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ 

Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at

Ed's Socials:

https://twitter.com/edzitron

https://www.instagram.com/edzitron

https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com

https://www.threads.net/@edzitron

Email Me: ez@betteroffline.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

2025-11-12 7 min Transcript
Listen elsewhere

Available Results

Generated results are saved to your library for reuse and search.

No generated results are available for this episode yet.

Transcript

Open the Transcript tab to load the transcript.

Chapters

No chapters available.