Anthropic Just Passed OpenAI and Filed for an IPO at $965 Billion
The pecking order in AI just flipped, and the Anthropic IPO that everyone in tech has been waiting for suddenly looks a lot closer. For about three years, one name sat at the top of the AI money pile. As of late May 2026, there’s a new one.
Anthropic, the company behind the Claude AI models, just closed a $65 billion funding round that values it at $965 billion. That’s not a guess or a projection. It’s a real number on a real deal, and it bumps Anthropic past OpenAI as the most valuable private AI company on the planet.
A few days later, it filed to go public. Here’s what actually went down with the Anthropic IPO, and why it’s a bigger deal than the headline number.
The round that flipped the leaderboard
Anthropic’s Series H closed on May 28, 2026. It raised $65 billion at a $965 billion post-money valuation, with Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks, and Sequoia leading the way.
The speed is the wild part. Back in February, the company was worth $380 billion. This round nearly tripled that in a few months, which is about as fast as a valuation has ever climbed in tech.
It passed OpenAI for the first time
This is the moment people will remember. OpenAI, the name that’s topped every AI list for years, last said it was heading toward an $852 billion valuation after raising $122 billion in March. Anthropic’s $965 billion sails past that and makes it the new private-market leader.
Keep in mind Anthropic started life as a research lab run by people who’d left OpenAI. Watching it overtake its old employer is a real shift in who’s running the AI show.
Inside the Anthropic IPO
On June 1, Anthropic quietly filed draft paperwork for an IPO. If it lists this fall, the Anthropic IPO would be the first by a big pure-play AI company, beating OpenAI, which is reportedly aiming for the fourth quarter of 2026.
Word is that OpenAI’s leadership isn’t thrilled about the idea of finishing second here. In a race this public, going first matters. The first AI IPO becomes the yardstick everyone else gets measured against.
The revenue behind the hype
Numbers this big always raise the same eyebrow: is any of it real? Anthropic’s sales suggest it is. The company expects to post $10.9 billion in revenue for the second quarter of 2026. That’s more than double the $4.8 billion it pulled in during the first quarter, and more than it made in all of 2025, in a single quarter.
You can be skeptical about AI valuations and still admit that’s a business growing scary fast.
Why it matters
A $965 billion private valuation and a pending IPO aren’t just bragging rights. They’re a test of whether investors actually believe AI revenue can justify the eye-watering sums being spent on it. If the Anthropic IPO goes well, expect a line of AI companies to follow it onto the public markets, the same way the AI spending boom is already reshaping the tools developers use every day. If it flops, the funding math gets harder for everyone.
Either way, the AI race just changed shape. It’s not only about benchmarks and model launches anymore. Now it’s about earnings reports too.
The figures here reflect what was reported as of June 2026 and could shift as the IPO process plays out.
