Anthropic Upcoming IPO: Claude creator takes key step toward going public

The race among large language model (LLM) makers to go public is gaining momentum. Anthropic, the Claude chatbot maker, has confidentially submitted a draft S-1 to the SEC, taking a step toward a potential public listing.³ A public listing could provide greater financial transparency and market-based valuation data than is currently available for private companies such as Anthropic and OpenAI, the organization behind ChatGPT.

The confidential filing comes after Anthropic reportedly hired the law firm Wilson Sonsini and held preliminary conversations with investment banks in late 2025.⁵ While no definitive listing date has been set, the recent filing marks an important milestone toward a potential public offering.

Meanwhile, OpenAI has confidentially filed for an initial public offering (IPO), with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley reportedly leading the offering.⁶ Reuters has reported that the company's valuation could reach as much as $1 trillion in connection with a public offering,⁷ although the final valuation and timing of any IPO remain subject to market conditions and other factors.

As a result, investors are watching both companies closely as each progresses through the IPO process and additional details about any potential offerings emerge.

Anthropic's confidential S-1 filing

Anthropic took a major step toward the public market by confidentially submitting a draft registration statement to the SEC.⁸ A confidential filing allows a company to begin the regulatory review process out of the public eye, providing flexibility to adjust its prospectus and timing based on market conditions and SEC feedback.

Under the JOBS Act, companies can submit draft registration statements confidentially, a route commonly used by high-growth technology companies. The SEC reviews the filing and provides comments, and the company can revise its prospectus through multiple rounds before making anything public. Anthropic would need to publicly file an amended S-1 at least 15 days before beginning a roadshow to market the offering to institutional investors.

This procedural milestone suggests the company is actively laying the groundwork for an IPO, though the exact timeline remains fluid. Market conditions, competitive dynamics and Anthropic's own growth trajectory could all influence the final decision on when to price the offering.

Anthropic: Company background

Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, who both came from OpenAI. Dario was the Vice President of Research at OpenAI, and Daniela was the Vice President of Safety & Policy.⁹ Anthropic has also recruited other ex-OpenAI staff, such as OpenAI co-founder John Schulman.¹⁰

The company is a public benefit corporation, with a mission to safely develop AI for humanity's long-term benefit.¹¹ In addition to developing Claude, Anthropic is also an AI research and safety company.

Anthropic and the AI competitive landscape

While ChatGPT is the most popular AI chatbot as of April 2026,¹² there are several companies with similar offerings, creating stiff competition to win over customers. In addition to Anthropic's Claude, some examples of other top competitors include Google's Gemini, Meta's Llama, Perplexity's Sonar and xAI's Grok. Amidst the competition, these companies frequently release new, more powerful models.

Yet running these models can be very expensive, due to costs associated with areas such as data center usage and the acquisition or leasing of AI chips for training and inference. These resource requirements may create capital pressures for companies working to advance LLMs.

Access to public-market financing through an IPO can provide companies like Anthropic with a way to raise additional funding for ongoing development. In that context, an earlier public listing by one company relative to another would primarily reflect differences in the timing of access to public-market capital, rather than implying any advantage in business performance, technological capabilities or long-term prospects.

That said, other rivals like Google already have access to public market financing and the advantages that come from its stature. The ability of these AI companies to create better models also depends on factors like the technical capabilities of staff, R&D processes and acquisitions.

The way Anthropic and other AI companies operate in the coming years will affect the quality of their products, which will ultimately affect which LLMs customers favor and how model makers monetize their offerings. It's possible that some of the current LLM leaders will shrink or disappear altogether, while others rake in revenue from subscriptions and perhaps new AI income streams like advertising.

Anthropic's approach to stay relevant amidst the competition has been to focus more on B2B sales rather than the mass market angle of OpenAI.¹³ Anthropic has also been more conservative with its spending. While it lost around $5.6 billion in 2024,¹⁴ the company expects it will achieve $70 billion in revenue and $17 billion in positive free cash flow by 2028.¹⁵ Meanwhile, OpenAI projects it will lose $74 billion in 2028 but will turn a profit by 2030.¹⁶

Still, Anthropic and other LLM creators typically have a long way to go to meet their financial goals, and there's no telling if their projections will materialize. Anthropic reached a $9 billion annualized revenue run rate by the end of 2025,¹⁷ which represented a jump from crossing a $5 billion run rate in Aug. 2025,¹⁸ but that's still far from the $70 billion goal for 2028.

Anthropic funding history and private market valuation

The growth of AI has coincided with massive capital inflows. Anthropic has raised significant funding across multiple primary rounds since its founding in 2021, with its most recent Series H in 2026 valuing the company at $965 billion.²⁰

Initially, the Anthropic Series A in May 2021 raised around $125 million at approximately a $623 million valuation. This funding round included investment from several high-profile individuals such as Jaan Tallinn, James McClave, Dustin Moskovitz and Eric Schmidt, as well as the Center for Emerging Risk Research.²¹

In Feb. 2023, Anthropic took a big leap forward, raising nearly $1 billion for its Series B at a valuation north of $4 billion. This round also included investment from several individuals such as Sam Bankman-Fried, Caroline Ellison and Nishad Singh.²²

A few months later, in May 2023, a two-part Series C brought Anthropic's valuation to around $5 billion, with several institutional investors joining in, such as Google, Salesforce Ventures, Sound Ventures and Zoom Ventures.²³ By October that same year, with Claude having launched just a few months earlier in March, Google invested in Anthropic again at nearly a $15 billion valuation.²⁴

Then, in early 2024, Amazon invested in Anthropic too, first in March at an $18.4 billion valuation, and then again in November at over a $41 billion valuation.²⁵

Anthropic's valuation kept rapidly climbing in early 2025, when it raised about $4.5 billion at a $61.5 billion valuation from institutional investors such as Lightspeed Venture Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, Cisco Investments and Fidelity. Half a year later in Sept. 2025, a multi-part Series F from investors such as ICONIQ Capital, BlackRock, Blackstone and Coatue Management raised around $13 billion and roughly tripled Anthropic's valuation to $183 billion.²⁶

Subsequent funding rounds accelerated the trajectory even further. In 2026, Anthropic closed a $65 billion Series H at a $965 billion post-money valuation, underscoring the scale of investor appetite for AI infrastructure as the company potentially moves closer to a public listing.²⁷

Looking ahead

With a confidential S-1 now submitted, Anthropic could, if it chooses to proceed with a public offering, eventually move to the public filing of an amended registration statement, followed by a roadshow and potential pricing of an IPO. However, there can be no assurance that Anthropic will complete an initial public offering. The timeline for each of these steps depends on regulatory feedback, market conditions and the company's own strategic decisions. 

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