NVIDIA Q1 FY 2027 earnings preview: is AI demand strong enough? 

When will NVIDIA report its latest earnings?

NVIDIA is set to report its first-quarter (Q1) fiscal year (FY) 2027 earnings on Wednesday, 20 May 2026, after the United States (US) market closes.

The backdrop

NVIDIA's fourth-quarter (Q4) and full-year FY 2026 earnings, released on 25 February 2026, delivered another commanding performance, reinforcing its leadership in the artificial intelligence (AI) chip market. The company comfortably beat Wall Street expectations on both revenue and earnings per share (EPS), fuelled by explosive demand for its graphics processing units.

At the heart of the results was the strong ramp of the Blackwell architecture. Chief executive officer Jensen Huang captured the excitement in his signature style:

'Computing demand is growing exponentially – the agentic AI inflection point has arrived. Grace Blackwell with NVLink is the king of inference today – delivering an order-of-magnitude lower cost per token – and Vera Rubin will extend that leadership even further,' said Jensen Huang, founder and chief executive officer of NVIDIA. 'Enterprise adoption of agents is skyrocketing. Our customers are racing to invest in AI compute – the factories powering the AI industrial revolution and their future growth.'

Despite the blowout numbers, the stock dropped 5.46% in the following session to $184.89. That reaction reflected the familiar post-earnings mix of profit-taking, concerns around stretched valuations and the market's ever-rising expectations for NVIDIA's growth.

Highlights from the previous quarter

NVIDIA's Q4 results capped off an extraordinary FY 2026, showing powerful year-on-year (YoY) and quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) gains, once again driven overwhelmingly by AI-related demand in the data centre business.

Key metrics included:

• Revenue: $68.1 billion, beating consensus estimates and marking a 73% YoY increase. This also represented a strong 20% QoQ gain.
• Earnings per share: Generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) EPS of $1.62 on a non-GAAP basis, comfortably ahead of forecasts and up roughly 80% YoY.
• Net income: GAAP net income reached a record $42.96 billion (up 94% YoY), while non-GAAP net income was $39.55 billion (up 79% YoY).
• Gross margins: Non-GAAP gross margin expanded to 75.2%, highlighting NVIDIA's continued pricing power and product-mix shift toward higher-margin AI offerings.

Segment breakdown highlights:

• Data centre: A record $62.3 billion, up 75% YoY and representing more than 91% of total revenue.
• Gaming: $3.7 billion, up 47% YoY, but down 13% QoQ due to normal post-holiday inventory moderation.
• Professional visualisation: $1.3 billion, up strongly YoY.
• Automotive: $604 million, up 6% YoY.

Summary of NVIDIA's Q4 FY 2026 results

Key expectations and metrics for Q1 2027

NVIDIA's Q1 FY 2027 guidance from its Q4 earnings provided the following snapshot:

Q1 FY 2027 outlook

Street expectations are as follows:

• Revenue: $78.50 billion (up from $68.1 billion in Q4)
• Earnings per share (EPS): $1.75 (up from $1.62 in Q4)
• Gross margins: 74.52% (down from 75.20% in Q4)
• Data centre revenue: $73.1 billion (up from $62.3 billion in Q4)
• Gaming revenues: $3.5 billion (down from $3.7 billion in Q4)

NVIDIA data centre revenue chart

Key areas of focus

AI infrastructure demand durability and broadening

Investors will look for confirmation that hyperscaler demand remains extremely strong, alongside evidence that the AI build-out is expanding beyond the Big Tech five – Meta, Microsoft, Google and Amazon – into enterprises, sovereign AI projects, vertical industries and smaller customers.

Blackwell ramp and execution

Markets want detailed updates on production scale, yields, customer acceptance and revenue contribution from Blackwell. Early feedback on Blackwell Ultra – effectively Blackwell on steroids – and deployment timelines will also be closely watched.

Next-generation roadmap – Rubin

Any early signals around the Rubin architecture, targeted for a second-half calendar year 2026 ramp, will be important. Investors are seeking reassurance of a smooth generational hand-off from Blackwell without major order pauses, while preserving pricing power and margins.

Supply chain, capacity and lead times

Progress at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and advanced-packaging partners, current lead times for flagship graphics processing units and whether supply constraints are easing or still capping upside.

Gross margin sustainability

Whether NVIDIA can hold or expand non-GAAP gross margins around the 75% level as Blackwell mix increases.

Capital allocation and shareholder returns

With a substantial cash position and strong free cash flow, markets will watch for updates on dividends, share buybacks or increased investment in the software ecosystem – a theme that could support a re-rating of the stock.

Regulatory and China exposure

Any fresh commentary on US export restrictions and the still-limited impact on data centre revenue from China.

Guidance for second-quarter fiscal 2027

This remains the biggest potential catalyst. Consensus currently clusters around $86 – $87 billion. A strong beat-and-raise would reinforce the view that the AI capital expenditure cycle still has significant runway.

Circular deals: growth engine or bubble risk?

Circular AI deals – where hyperscalers, model developers and cloud providers effectively invest in and buy from one another in a self-reinforcing loop – remain one of the most debated features of the current boom.

NVIDIA has participated in dozens of such arrangements, including equity investments in OpenAI, CoreWeave and others. On the surface, this ecosystem can appear self-sustaining, with capital flowing back and forth to support graphics processing unit orders that in turn validate high valuations.

However, over the past quarter the debate has evolved. Stronger enterprise adoption, sovereign AI projects and broader vertical demand across healthcare, automotive and financial services have demonstrated that real end-user usage is picking up. Management has repeatedly emphasised multi-year contracts and rising utilisation rates across deployed clusters.

The key question heading into these results is whether the demand mix is continuing to shift from capital-markets-driven circular flows toward genuine, usage-based infrastructure build-out. Clear evidence of broadening customer cohorts and sustained high utilisation would further ease bubble concerns, while signs of continued concentration among a small group of well-funded players could keep the debate alive.

Is NVIDIA a buy or a sell?

NVIDIA has a TipRanks Smart Score of 10 – Outperform and is rated a Strong Buy, with 40 Buy, one Hold and one Sell recommendation, as of 12 May 2026.

NVIDIA TipRanks Smart Score

NVIDIA technical analysis

NVIDIA shares have rallied an impressive 154% from the April 2025 low of $86.62, reaching a high of $220.30 on 11 May. The move appears to mark the latter stages of a clear five-wave Elliott Wave advance, with the most recent leg now pushing into fresh highs.

Adding to the cautionary tone is bearish divergence on the relative strength index (RSI) – a classic warning sign that upside momentum is fading even as price makes new highs. This suggests near-term upside may be limited and that a corrective pullback is becoming the higher-probability scenario.

The first meaningful support zone sits in the $195 – $193 area, defined by a cluster of prior highs and reinforced by the rising 200-day moving average near $184.73. A decisive break below this region would open the door to a deeper correction, with the next major downside target around the double-bottom zone near $164.

On the upside, any post-earnings surge would likely meet strong resistance near $240. That level is defined by a trendline connecting the June 2024 high of $140.76 and the October 2025 swing high of $212.19.

In short, the technical picture remains constructive over the medium term. However, the combination of Elliott Wave completion and RSI divergence suggests a period of consolidation or pullback is increasingly likely – whether it arrives before or after NVIDIA's earnings report.

NVIDIA daily chart

• _{The figures stated are as of 12 May 2026. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance. This report does not contain and is not to be taken as containing any financial product advice or financial product recommendation.}