Update, 2 Nov: what the earnings call added. On the call, chief financial officer David Glazer described the new revenue guidance midpoint as “a nine point increase over our full year 2026 revenue guidance from last quarter”, meaning the implied growth rate rose from 82% to 91%, and said Palantir was raising its 2026 adjusted income from operations guidance to between $5.245 billion and $5.249 billion. In our machine transcription of the webcast, no executive gave an outlook for 2027. Our piece on the call.
Measured against the $7.190 billion midpoint Palantir first gave in February, the three raises equal 6.5%, 6.9% and 5.3% of that original guide, 18.7% in all, by our arithmetic. The November raise also covers one remaining quarter, against three in May and two in August: about $151 million of it is the third quarter landing above the midpoint of its own guide, and about $227 million is a higher fourth quarter.
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The key insight: By our arithmetic, Palantir’s three 2026 guidance raises equal 6.5%, 6.9% and 5.3% of its February guide, and the November raise of $378 million was the smallest in dollars, though it covers one remaining quarter against three in May and two in August.
Palantir first guided 2026 revenue to between $7.182 billion and $7.198 billion in its fourth-quarter 2025 release of 2 February, a growth rate its headline put at 61% year over year. It raised the range to $7.650 billion to $7.662 billion in its first-quarter release of 4 May (71%, per that headline), to $8.150 billion to $8.158 billion in its second-quarter release of 3 August (82%) and to $8.530 billion to $8.534 billion on 2 November (91%).
At the midpoint, that is $7.190 billion, $7.656 billion, $8.154 billion and $8.532 billion. The steps are $466 million, $498 million and $378 million, and the November step is 24% smaller than August’s, our arithmetic. Palantir’s 2025 revenue, the base for those growth rates, was $4.475 billion.
The floor Palantir gives for US commercial revenue moved in smaller steps: “in excess of $3.144 billion” in February, $3.224 billion in May, $3.424 billion in August and “in excess of $3.559 billion” now, which Palantir says represents growth of at least 143%. That floor is $415 million, or 13.2%, above where it started, by our arithmetic.
Palantir’s full-year 2026 revenue guidance at the midpoint of the range given in each of its four 2026 earnings releases (8-K Exhibit 99.1): $7.182-7.198 billion on 2 February, $7.650-7.662 billion on 4 May, $8.150-8.158 billion on 3 August and $8.530-8.534 billion on 2 November. Midpoints, steps and shares of the February guide are our arithmetic.Animated: Palantir’s full-year 2026 revenue guidance midpoint at each of its four 2026 earnings releases, $ billion. Midpoints and steps are our arithmetic from Palantir’s ranges; guidance is Palantir’s outlook.
Each Quarter Against the Top of Palantir’s Own Guide
Each quarterly release also gives a revenue range for the next quarter. Against the top of that range, reported revenue came in $76 million (5.7%) higher in the fourth quarter of 2025 and $97 million (6.3%) higher in the first quarter of 2026. It was $134 million (7.5%) higher in the second quarter and $149 million (6.9%) higher in the third, by our arithmetic from the exact revenue figures in each release.
The ranges Palantir gives are narrow, $4 million wide in each of these quarters, so the distance to the midpoint is $2 million more than the distance to the top. That lets the full-year raises be split, our arithmetic from midpoints. In May, about $99 million of the $466 million raise was the first quarter landing above its guide midpoint, and about $367 million was added to the remaining three quarters. In August, about $136 million was the second quarter and about $362 million was added to the second half.
Spread over the quarters still to report, the part of each raise added to future quarters works out to about $122 million a quarter in May, $181 million in August and $227 million in November, by our arithmetic. The raises shrank in dollars while the amount added per remaining quarter grew.
What the Fourth-Quarter Guide Implies
Palantir guided fourth-quarter revenue to between $2.649 billion and $2.653 billion. Its first three quarters of 2026 add up to $5.881 billion, according to the release, so the $2.651 billion fourth-quarter midpoint plus reported revenue equals the $8.532 billion full-year midpoint: the full-year guide is now the fourth-quarter guide plus results already reported.
Against fourth-quarter 2025 revenue of $1.407 billion, the midpoint is 88% higher, compared with the 96% year-over-year growth Palantir reported for the third quarter. Against third-quarter revenue of $2.313 billion, the midpoint is 14.6% higher, by our arithmetic. The four previous quarterly guides implied sequential growth of 12.5%, 9.0%, 10.2% and 11.7% at their midpoints, and Palantir then reported quarter-over-quarter growth of 19%, 16%, 19% and 20%.
Palantir does not give a fourth-quarter figure for US commercial revenue. Its releases put US commercial revenue at $595 million, $764 million and $984 million in the first three quarters, $2.343 billion in all. The full-year floor of more than $3.559 billion leaves at least $1.216 billion for the fourth quarter, our arithmetic from rounded figures. That figure is at least 140% above the $507 million Palantir reported for the fourth quarter of 2025; third-quarter US commercial revenue grew 148%.
As we read it, the business lever in these releases is the guide itself: Palantir sets the bar each quarter, and in the four quarters we checked revenue came in 5.7% to 7.5% above the top of it. The full-year range has moved up by $1.342 billion at the midpoint since February, by our arithmetic.
The Structural Read
As we read it, the dollar size of each raise depends partly on how many quarters are left to raise: the part added to future quarters works out to about $122 million a quarter in May, $181 million in August and $227 million in November, by our arithmetic.
As we read it, the pattern in the four quarters we checked is consistent: each time, reported revenue landed $76 million to $149 million above the top of Palantir’s own range, and Palantir then raised the full-year range.
Alex Karp, Palantir co-founder and CEO, Q3 2026 earnings release
“Witness our third quarter results: overall revenue soared 96% year-over-year, U.S. commercial revenue grew 148% year-over-year and 29% sequentially, and aggregate U.S. revenue grew 119% year-over-year.”
Three Implications
FOR READERS OF GUIDANCE Palantir’s quarterly ranges have been $4 million wide, and reported revenue has landed 5.7% to 7.5% above their top in each of the last four quarters, by our arithmetic from its releases.
FOR THE FOURTH QUARTER Palantir guided revenue to between $2.649 billion and $2.653 billion, a midpoint 14.6% above third-quarter revenue, by our arithmetic; the four previous guides implied 9.0% to 12.5%.
FOR US COMMERCIAL The full-year floor of more than $3.559 billion leaves at least $1.216 billion of US commercial revenue for the fourth quarter, by our arithmetic from the rounded quarterly figures Palantir reported.
The framework puts it this way: “In the embedding era, value comes from what the software connects to.”
As we read it, Palantir’s releases measure the outcome, not that mechanism: they report revenue and guidance, not how much of the growth comes from existing customers connecting Palantir to more of their systems. The framework was published in December 2025 and does not discuss these results.
This piece is based on Palantir’s quarterly earnings releases, filed as Exhibit 99.1 to its 8-K reports of 3 November 2025 and 2 February, 4 May, 3 August and 2 November 2026. Midpoints, steps, shares, the split of each raise and the implied fourth-quarter figures are our arithmetic, not company statements; Palantir does not publish them. The split of each raise assumes the earlier guide’s quarters sat at their midpoints, and the US commercial floor is stated by Palantir as a minimum.
Guidance is Palantir’s own outlook, not ours. We did not read the earnings call, the investor presentation, analyst estimates or the 10-Q for the quarter, which had not been filed when we read the releases. We did not contact Palantir.
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Palantir’s full-year 2026 revenue guide has moved from a $7.190 billion midpoint in February to $8.532 billion in November in three raises, $466 million, $498 million and $378 million, by our arithmetic. Each of the last four quarters came in above the top of Palantir’s own range, by $76 million to $149 million, and the fourth-quarter range of $2.649 billion to $2.653 billion is 88% above the same quarter of 2025 at its midpoint.
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A note on sourcing. Every company figure comes from Palantir’s quarterly earnings releases, filed with the SEC as Exhibit 99.1 to its 8-K reports of 3 November 2025 and 2 February, 4 May, 3 August and 2 November 2026, read on EDGAR on 2 November. Guidance midpoints, steps, shares, the split of each raise and implied fourth-quarter figures are our arithmetic. Guidance is Palantir’s outlook, not a FourWeekMBA forecast. We did not contact Palantir.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
