- The global cloud market hit $330 billion in 2024
- That's up more than $100 billion from 2022, Synergy said
- GenAI has driven at least half of the growth the industry has seen, the firm said
It seems enterprises are putting their money where their mouth is when it comes to generative AI (GenAI), with the technology driving a massive revenue spike for cloud providers in the final quarter of 2024.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) reported a revenue jump of 19% to $28.8 billion, with operating income up $3.5 billion year on year to $10.6 billion. Meanwhile, Google Cloud revenue was up 30% to $12 billion and Microsoft’s Intelligent Cloud segment revenue increased 19% to $25.5 billion.
For the full year 2024, AWS sales tallied $107.6 billion, while Microsoft and Google Cloud brought in $104.8 billion and $43.3 billion, respectively. Microsoft’s total reflects Intelligent Cloud revenue from Q3 of the company’s fiscal 2024 to Q2 of fiscal 2025, but it’s worth noting that Microsoft doesn’t break out pure cloud revenue the way its rivals do. You can read more about why that matters here.
Inclusive of smaller cloud providers, Synergy Research Group determined that revenue from the global cloud market hit a whopping $330 billion in 2024. That represents growth of around $102 billion since 2022.
Notably, Synergy Chief Analyst John Dinsdale said AI is at the heart of the surge.
“Since ChatGPT was launched at the end of 2022, GenAI has been responsible for about half of the total cloud market growth, either through new GenAI/GPU services or GenAI-enabled enhancements to existing cloud services,” he wrote in an email.
Rising tide
And it’s not just hyperscalers that are benefitting. The rising AI tide is lifting the boats of smaller and niche cloud players as well.
Synergy noted that CoreWeave broke into the top 20 ranking of cloud providers by market share. The company, alongside Oracle, Snowflake, Cloudflare and Databricks, had one of the fastest growth rates in Q4 2024.
That said, the big three still dominate market share. According to Synergy’s tally, AWS ended the year with a 30% market share, followed by Microsoft (21%), Google (12%), Alibaba (4%) and Oracle (3%).