CoreWeave 2026 Compute Capacity Sold Out, $32.5B Capex Guideline and 5-6 Year Contracts
CoreWeave reports 2026 compute capacity is broadly sold out as customers sign longer take-or-pay contracts now weighted toward five-to-six-year terms across A100, H100, H200 and Blackwell GPUs. The company plans $30–35 billion in capex (midpoint $32.5B), sees Q1 margin trough before ramping to roughly 25% contribution margin.
1. Insatiable AI Demand and Capacity Sell-Out
CoreWeave’s co-founder and chief development officer highlighted that AI infrastructure demand remains overwhelming, driving billable compute capacity for 2026 to be broadly sold out. Customer requests span multiple GPU generations—including A100, H100, H200 and Blackwell—and now extend beyond AI labs to hyperscaler cloud clients and large enterprises.
2. Longer Take-or-Pay Contracts
Take-or-pay contract durations have extended from roughly three years two years ago to four years a year ago, and now skew toward five-year terms, with some agreements reaching six years. Management attributes the longer commitments to enterprise adoption of AI workloads and the need for predictable capacity over multi-year horizons.
3. Capex Guidance and Margin Outlook
CoreWeave is guiding $30 billion to $35 billion of capital expenditure this cycle, with a midpoint of $32.5 billion financed at the asset-company level. Rapid growth has squeezed margins through Q1, but management expects a three-month ramp to stabilize operations and deliver a roughly 25% contribution margin for months three through 60 of each contract.
4. NVIDIA Relationship and Software Expansion
An expanded agreement with NVIDIA includes a reported $2 billion incremental investment to accelerate infrastructure growth and reflects confidence in CoreWeave’s operational software stack. The company is exploring sales of its software solution to third parties and reports a storage attach rate above 80% for customers generating over $1 million in revenue, with storage ARR exceeding $100 million.