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    META
    Earnings call· Jun 2026(Q2 FY26)

    Meta Platforms Q2 FY26 earnings call META

    Jul 29, 2026 Source

    Executive summary

    Meta Platforms, Inc. Q2 FY26 — AI Investments Drive Core Business Growth and New Product Development

    Meta's Q2 FY26 performance highlights the accelerating impact of AI investments on its core business, driving significant engagement and ad revenue growth. The company is aggressively building out infrastructure and developing new personal and business AI agents, alongside external compute monetization opportunities. This strategic focus aims to balance substantial near-term investments with long-term value creation, leveraging Meta's scale to distribute superintelligence widely.

    Highlights

    5
    • 3.6 billion people using at least one Meta app daily, showcasing broad community reach.

    • Family of Apps ad revenue grew 27% year-over-year to $59.4 billion, outpacing competitors.

    • Total revenue increased 28% year-over-year to $60.8 billion.

    • Instagram reached 2 billion daily actives, and Threads crossed 500 million monthly actives, becoming the fastest-growing conversation app ever.

    • 9 million small businesses are now using at least one of Meta's AI ad creative tools, indicating strong adoption of AI-powered solutions.

    Concerns

    5
    • Total expenses rose 55% year-over-year to $42 billion, including $2.4 billion in legal charges and $1.2 billion in severance expenses.

    • GAAP operating income declined 8% year-over-year to $18.8 billion.

    • Free cash flow was $784 million, significantly lower than capital expenditures of $31.1 billion.

    • Headcount decreased 3% from Q1 to 75,000 employees, following a May 2026 reduction impacting 8,000 employees.

    • The expected tax rate for the remaining quarters of 2026 increased to 15-17% from the prior outlook of 13-16%.

    Guidance & targets

    6
    CategoryTargetConfidence
    Total revenue
    $61 billion to $64 billion
    high materiality
    High
    Total revenue growth FX impact
    approximately 1% headwind
    medium materiality
    High
    Full year 2026 total expenses
    $165 billion to $169 billion
    high materiality
    High
    Full year 2026 operating income
    above 2025 operating income
    high materiality
    High
    Full year 2026 capital expenditures
    $130 billion to $145 billion
    high materiality
    High
    Remaining quarters 2026 tax rate
    between 15% to 17%
    medium materiality
    High

    Segment performance

    2
    SegmentRevenueYoYQoQMargin
    Family of Apps
    Strong growth driven by engagement, users, ad load optimizations, ad performance gains, and improved macro conditions. Partially offset by strong impression growth from lower monetizing surfaces and regions.
    Ad revenue: $59.4 billionAd revenue growth YoY: 27%Ad revenue growth YoY (constant currency): 26%Ad impressions served: 14% increaseGlobal average price per ad: 12% increaseOther revenue: $1 billionOther revenue growth YoY: 73%WhatsApp paid messaging and subscriptions revenue: primary driver of other revenue growth
    $60.4 billion28%
    Reality Labs
    Revenue growth due to strong performance in AI glasses, partially offset by reduced Quest headset sales.
    AI glasses revenue: strong growthQuest headset sales: lower
    $431 million16%

    Operational metrics

    22
    Total employees
    75,000down 3% from Q1
    Q2 FY26

    Includes approximately 8,000 employees impacted by the May 2026 headcount reduction.

    Employees impacted by headcount reduction
    8,000
    May 2026

    The majority of impacted employees are expected to no longer be captured in headcount by the end of Q3 2026.

    GAAP operating income
    $18.8 billion8% decline year-over-year
    Q2 FY26

    Includes $2.4 billion in legal charges and $1.2 billion in severance expenses.

    Operating income growth (excluding charges)
    9%year-over-year
    Q2 FY26

    Excludes Q2 legal charges and severance expenses.

    Tax rate
    16%
    Q2 FY26
    Net income
    $15.8 billion
    Q2 FY26
    Diluted EPS
    $6.18
    Q2 FY26
    Cash and marketable securities
    $90.3 billion
    Q2 FY26
    Total debt
    $83.7 billion
    Q2 FY26
    Instagram global time spent
    double digitsyear-over-year
    Q2 FY26

    Largely driven by improvements to Feed and Reels recommendations.

    Facebook video time spent
    9%year-over-year
    Q2 FY26
    Facebook video time spent
    over 10%year-over-year
    Q2 FY26

    Driven by ranking improvements.

    Daily users interacting with Meta AI
    60%
    last month

    Since rebuilding Meta AI and integrating Muse Spark.

    Reels sessions increase from ranking improvement
    15 basis point
    Q2 FY26

    Combining faster inference with a new architecture, strong indicators of better content-to-user matching.

    Recommended content less than 1 day old on Instagram Feed
    over halfmore than double from a year ago
    Q2 FY26
    App event conversions increase from LLM-based user preferences
    1%
    Q2 FY26

    Early pilots using LLMs to better understand user preferences.

    Ad clicks increase from GEM model
    8.3%
    Q2 FY26

    Combined with user understanding models and sequence learning.

    Conversions uplift from GEM model
    15.7%
    Q2 FY26

    Combined with user understanding models and sequence learning.

    Advantage+ end-to-end solutions annual revenue run rate
    $75 billion
    Q2 FY26

    Continuing to grow, with compounding performance gains for advertisers leveraging multiple tools.

    Small businesses using AI creative tools
    9 million
    Q2 FY26

    Adoption of GenAI ad creative tools continues to scale.

    Movida daily bookings increase via WhatsApp Business Agent
    44%compared to the same period in the prior year
    1-month period

    After deploying a business agent on WhatsApp to handle the entire booking flow.

    Movida conversations resolved by AI agent
    85%
    1-month period

    Resolved entirely by the AI agent without human assistance.

    Industry KPIs

    6
    MetricValueDetails
    Family dap dau3.6 billionpeople
    CAPEX compute commitments$31.1 billionUSD
    Advertising revenue by segment$59.4 billionUSD
    Share buyback capital returned
    Ai feature adoption monetization9 millionsmall businesses
    Custom silicon ai infrastructure

    Product announcements

    11
    ProductTypeDetails
    Meta Onelaunch
    Muse Spark 1.1milestone
    Muse Imagemilestone
    Instagram Instantslaunch
    Forumlaunch
    Sellerlaunch
    Meta Glasseslaunch
    Incognito modelaunch
    Meta Business Agentsexpansion
    Meta Business Agent platformlaunch
    High intelligence model API (Muse Spark)launch

    Deals & partnerships

    2
    BlackRockStrategic venture to develop a new 1 gigawatt data center in El Paso, Texas.

    Part of Meta's Meta Compute effort, serving as an example of partnerships to complement its approach to building infrastructure capacity.

    Kunal ShahKunal Shah joined Meta as the new Head of WhatsApp.

    A key leadership hire for the WhatsApp team.

    Risks & headwinds

    6
    Charges related to legal proceedingsQ2 FY26

    $2.4 billion

    Mitigation: Incorporated into the full year 2026 expense outlook.

    Severance expenses from headcount reductionQ2 FY26

    $1.2 billion

    Mitigation: The majority of impacted employees are expected to no longer be captured in headcount by the end of Q3 2026.

    Increased total expensesQ2 FY26

    Up 55% year-over-year to $42 billion

    Mitigation: Growth primarily driven by increases in employee compensation (especially AI talent), infrastructure costs (depreciation, data center operating costs, third-party cloud spend), legal-related costs, and third-party AI token costs.

    Youth-related legal and regulatory mattersthis year

    May ultimately result in a material loss

    Mitigation: The company continues to monitor active legal and regulatory matters, with several youth-related trials scheduled in the U.S.

    Foreign currency headwindQ3 2026

    Approximately 1% headwind to year-over-year total revenue growth

    Mitigation: Based on current exchange rates, factored into revenue guidance.

    Overall industry capacity tightness for computeforeseeable future

    Will remain tight for the foreseeable future

    Mitigation: Strategic investments in internal custom silicon efforts and partnerships like BlackRock aim to provide long-term strategic flexibility and supply chain leverage.

    What to watch in Q3 FY26

    5

    AI Product Velocity & ROIC

    soon / in '26 and '27
    CurrentOptimistic about meaningful growth across all areas
    TargetConcrete examples of ROIC from consumer/business agents, API, or compute sales

    Why it matters

    Verifies the monetization potential of Meta's significant AI investments and the ability to translate innovation into financial returns.

    I'm actually quite optimistic💬 that we're going to see meaningful growth in all of these areas. And I think we will have more to share soon on a number of them.

    Q&A highlights

    8

    Which new AI opportunities (consumer/business agents, API, compute rental) are expected to scale first in '26/'27 to show quantifiable ROIC for investors?

    Mark Zuckerberg expressed optimism for meaningful growth across all new AI areas, including optimizing the core business, new consumer products, API, business agents, developer tools, and direct compute sales. He noted that selling intelligence offers higher margins than selling compute directly, but both present significant opportunities.

    I'm actually quite optimistic that we're going to see meaningful growth in all of these areas. And I think we will have more to share soon on a number of them.

    asked by Brian Nowak · answered by Mark Zuckerberg

    3 min read7 chapters

    Detailed Narrative

    01

    AI Integration in Core Products

    Meta is deeply integrating large language models (LLMs) into its Instagram and Facebook recommendation systems to enhance content relevance and user engagement. New Muse Image and Muse Video models are expected to dramatically expand content discovery, offering a nearly infinite universe of personalized content. LLMs are also improving ad ranking and relevance, contributing to Meta's ads business reporting faster year-over-year revenue growth than competitors. The company is also seeing strong demand for new AI-powered creative tools, with 9 million small businesses using at least one tool.

    02

    New AI Product Development

    Meta is developing personal agents designed to work 24/7 on users' behalf across various life domains, aiming for a consumer-friendly product that is easy for billions to adopt. Messaging apps like WhatsApp are becoming increasingly important surfaces for interacting with Meta AI and future agents, with a focus on privacy and security features like incognito mode. The company also launched Meta One, a new subscription offering providing more tools and AI features across its apps, with plans for various tiers and pricing options.

    03

    Enterprise AI Opportunities

    Meta is expanding its enterprise offerings, including business agents globally available on WhatsApp and Messenger, with over 1 million businesses using them weekly. These agents are now rolling out on Instagram, and the company is building more agentic capabilities to summarize conversations and provide competitive intelligence. Future plans include a 'business-in-a-box' service, API access for Muse Spark, and direct monetization of compute, exemplified by a new strategic venture with BlackRock for a 1 gigawatt data center.

    04

    Infrastructure Investment and Strategy

    Meta is aggressively investing in infrastructure to meet the surging demand for AI, with current plans focused on maximizing capacity for 2026 and 2027. The company views near-term capacity as extremely valuable and aims for flexibility in 2028 and beyond by laying foundational data center and network infrastructure. Strategic investments in internal custom silicon efforts are also being made to provide long-term flexibility and supply chain leverage, as overall industry capacity is expected to remain tight.

    05

    Community Growth and Engagement

    Meta's platforms continue to demonstrate robust community growth, with 3.6 billion people using at least one app daily. Instagram reached a milestone of 2 billion daily actives, and Threads surpassed 500 million monthly actives, making it the fastest-growing conversation app ever. Facebook maintains over 2 billion daily actives, and WhatsApp achieved an all-time messaging record during the World Cup final, peaking at 30 million messages sent per second.

    06

    Monetization Efficiency and Ad Tools

    Ad impressions increased 14% year-over-year, and the global average price per ad increased 12% year-over-year, driven by performance gains and improved macro conditions. Meta Generative Recommender, an LLM-based ad system, showed notable improvements in ad performance, including a 1% increase in app event conversions on Instagram. Advantage+ end-to-end solutions reached over $75 billion in annual revenue run rate, with 9 million small businesses utilizing AI creative tools.

    07

    Hardware and Future Vision

    Meta Glasses, now shipping with Muse Spark, are exceeding early sales expectations, positioning glasses as the ideal form factor for seamless interaction with future personal superintelligence. Mark Zuckerberg articulated Meta's philosophy of distributing superintelligence widely and making AI affordable and accessible, believing this approach will build a strong business and a positive AI future. The company plans to share more on its glasses lineup at the upcoming Connect conference.

    AI-generated summary of the company’s earnings call. Not investment advice.