Adobe reports solid Q3, tops 1 billion monthly active users

Adobe’s third quarter results handily topped estimates and the company said its AI-first annual recurring revenue was up 150% from a year ago.

The company delivered third quarter earnings of $1.83 billion, or $4.62 a share, on revenue of $6.76 billion, up 13% from a year ago. Non-GAAP earnings for the quarter were $6.13 a share.

Wall Street analysts were expecting Adobe to report non-GAAP earnings of $6.09 a share on revenue of $6.7 billion.

• Adobe names Chakravarthy CEO
• Adobe Summit 2026: Agentic orchestration for CX, creative workflows

Outgoing CEO Shantanu Narayen said the company hit 1 billion monthly active users across its platform. Adobe named Anil Chakravarthy CEO effective Dec. 1.

In prepared remarks, Narayen said:

“Adobe will leverage AI to increase the reach, value and impact we will deliver to customers to drive our next decade of growth. AI enables us to democratize access to every creative discipline for everyone from the casual creator to the most seasoned creative professional; it enables us to meet the growing creativity and productivity needs of consumers and business professionals who are looking to stand out and communicate more effectively. With AI, Adobe uniquely empowers enterprises to deliver and orchestrate personalized customer experiences.”

Chakravarthy walked through the business unit results and said Adobe was well positioned for agentic AI software. He said the following on the earnings call:

• "Through Adobe CX Enterprise, we uniquely bring together creativity, marketing and agentic AI, simplifying and transforming how enterprises manage the customer lifecycle. We deliver this value through proprietary CX intelligence, agentic orchestration, governed workflow execution, open ecosystem connectivity and enterprise-grade trust, all of which we’ve built over several years, providing our customers a practical path from the apps they use today to an end-to-end agentic AI system."
• "With Firefly and Creative Cloud, Adobe is reinventing creative software with agentic AI to deliver immediate, personalized value— meeting users where they are, with tools and agents that adapt to their needs. Adobe remains committed to delivering intuitive, context-aware experiences that honor creative craft, accelerate creative velocity and ensure that the next generation of Creators can thrive in an ever-changing world. Adobe’s strategy is to offer customers choice as well as intelligent routing to use the best models for their needs, fully integrated in Adobe applications, eliminating the friction of switching between workflows and platforms."
• "Adobe is well positioned to be the global leader in agentic software for creativity, productivity and customer experience. We are building on tremendous assets: deep domain expertise; a proven track record of product innovation; a broad community of customers spanning individuals to small businesses to the largest enterprises in the world; diversified global routes to market; a values-driven culture; highly motivated employees; a trusted and well-recognized brand; and the financial strength to invest for the future."

CFO Steve Day said the company is expanding its user base with freemium accounts. Key numbers include:

• Adobe’s ARR exiting the quarter was $27.5 billion.
• Cash flow from operations was $2.52 billion.
• Customer group subscription revenue was $6.56 billion, up 14% from a year ago.
• Businesses professionals and consumers revenue was $1.91 billion, up 16% from a year ago.
• Creative and marketing professional subscription revenue was $4.65 billion, up 13%.

As for the outlook, Adobe projected fourth quarter revenue of $6.8 billion to $6.85 billion with non-GAAP earnings of $6.30 a share to $6.35 a share. Fiscal 2026 revenue will be between $26.576 billion to $26.626 billion with non-GAAP earnings of $24.45 a share to $24.50 a share.