Meta Q3 revenue tops estimates and Zuckerberg says Muse accounts have topped 10 million

Meta Platforms said Wednesday that its third-quarter profit jumped more than threefold, as the social media giant’s revenue climbed sharply.

The parent company of Facebook and Instagram reported net income of $9.86 billion, or $3.83 per share, for the July-September period. That’s up from a profit of $2.71 billion, or $1.05 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Revenue grew 26% to $64.60 billion, up from $51.24 billion in the prior-year quarter and above the $63.34 billion expected by Wall Street analysts.

“We hit major milestones this quarter toward delivering personal superintelligence for everyone — including launching Muse and Muse Wonder, our first frontier model,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a statement. “Our investments are paying off, the core business is strong, and we’re seeing velocity across the board.”

In August, Meta reached an $18 billion settlement with 48 U.S. states over the effects of social media on teen mental health. The company agreed to take steps to keep children under 13 off Instagram and Facebook and teens ages 14 and 18 in age-appropriate accounts.

Excluding the impact of a $9.89 billion charge related to this agreement, the company’s third-quarter earnings would have been $7.40 per share, Meta said. The-year ago quarter included a one-time tax charge of nearly $16 billion.

On Wednesday, a judge ordered Meta to pay New Mexico $25 billion after a jury found the company liable for deceiving users about privacy on Facebook, marking the biggest fine ever against the tech giant.

Meta said the number of daily active users on its “family of apps” — Facebook, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp — grew 3% from a year earlier to an average of 3.64 billion.

And during a call with analysts, Zuckerberg noted that more than 10 million people in the U.S. and Canada have set up accounts for Muse, the personal artificial intelligence agent the company launched in August.

“About 25% of people who have set up Muse use it on any given day,” he said. The agent is for people 18 and over and is designed to help users with day-to-day tasks like schedules, shopping and other plans.

The CEO noted that Muse requires significant computing power to run, but that the company expects to improve its cost efficiency by more than 10 times in the next year, “which will enable it to be profitable once the revenue lines are at scale.”

For the current quarter, Meta is forecasting revenue in the range of $73 billion to $76 billion, the midpoint of which is higher than the $73.65 billion analysts are expecting.

Total expenses were $51.61 billion, an increase of 68% year-over-year. This includes the charge stemming from its multistate legal settlement.

The Menlo Park, California-based company had 66,775 employees as of Sept. 30, a decrease of 15% year-over-year.

Management narrowed its estimate for 2026 capital expenditures. It now anticipates spending will range from $135 billion to $145 billion, compared with an earlier estimate of $130 billion to $145 billion.

Meta didn’t provide an estimate for spending next year but noted that it expects to continue investing aggressively to support its core and AI businesses.

The company also did not give revenue guidance for 2027. But it said it expects losses at its Reality Labs segment to narrow to around $15 billion next year as the company shifts investments to other areas, primarily AI. Reality Labs builds Meta’s augmented reality, virtual reality and related wearable devices.

Also Wednesday, Meta announced that its board approved the creation of a new class of publicly listed, nonvoting Class C common stock, effective in January. The move is intended in part to boost the company’s ability to raise capital for AI infrastructure investments.

“Meta plans to issue nonvoting shares to fund AI investments without diluting CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s control,” said Andrew Rocco, stock strategist at Zacks Investment Research.

Meta’s shares closed up 0.5% in regular trading Wednesday. The shares rose 2.9% in after-hours trading after the results were released. The stock is up 5.7% so far this year.