Tencent FY Q4 revenue beats estimates amid ramp up in AI investments

Tencent The Chinese tech giant on Wednesday reported full-year revenue that topped analysts’ forecasts as it continues to ramp up investments in AI.

Here’s how Tencent did in full-year earnings for 2025:

• Revenue: 751.8 billion Chinese yuan ($109 billion), according to data compiled by LSEG, beating the 750.7 billion Chinese yuan expected by analysts.

“We maintain healthy growth rates in 2025, as AI capabilities improve our ad targeting and support greater engagement with our games, and our cloud business exponentially improves revenue growth and profitability,” Tencent’s chairman and CEO Ma Huateng said in a statement.

“Our highly resilient and cash-generating core businesses provide us with the resources to fund our increasing investments in AI, including hiring top-tier AI talent and upgrading our AI infrastructure.”

Tencent has spent 18 billion Chinese yuan on AI products in 2025 and plans to double that this year, the company said in a call with media.

The quarterly result was “solid” and broadly in line with Citi’s expectations, analysts said in a note published after the earnings statement.

The positive surprise came from accelerated business services revenue growth of 22% in the fourth quarter, supported by strong cloud revenue in domestic and international markets – including AI-related services – as well as higher e-commerce technology charges, Citi analysts said.

Domestic games revenue was 164.2 billion Chinese yuan, up 18% year-on-year, underpinned by the “robust” performance of recently released “Delta Force” and evergreen games, Tencent said.

The owner of Chinese social media platform WeChat posted international games revenue of 77.4 billion Chinese yuan – surpassing $10 billion for the first time – and revenue from social networks rose 5% to 127.7 billion Chinese yuan.

Fintech and business services revenue rose 8% year-on-year to 229.4 billion Chinese yuan.

Revenue for the fourth quarter of 2025 rose 13% compared to the same period in 2024, to 194.4 billion Chinese yuan, ahead of analysts’ forecast of 193.5 billion Chinese yuan.

Most of Tencent’s revenue comes from gaming, but the company has looked to diversify by expanding into other areas, including cloud computing. The company said it will expand its cloud computing unit to Europe in 2025.

The head of Tencent’s cloud computing group told CNBC in January that it plans to expand its data center footprint in the Middle East. CNBC contacted the company to ask if those plans have changed in light of the Iran war.

– CNBC Evelyn Cheng contributed to this report.