This brief reports what Microsoft's 10-K, filed 2025-07-30, states, and nothing else. Every item below is a sentence the filing contains, quoted exactly and verified character-for-character against the document fetched from EDGAR. No inference is drawn and no claim is made about what any figure means.
The figures
| Metric | Value | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Advertising expense | $2.1 billion | fiscal years 2025 |
| Advertising expense | $1.7 billion | fiscal years 2024 |
| Advertising expense | $904 million | fiscal years 2023 |
Every figure above is quoted from the filing; the sentence it was read from appears under its beat below.
The evidence, by beat
ARR / NRR / NDR growth or dilution
Microsoft 365 Commercial cloud revenue growth Revenue from Microsoft 365 Commercial subscriptions, comprising Microsoft 365 Commercial, Enterprise Mobility + Security, the cloud portion of Windows Commercial, the per-user portion of Power BI, Exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Microsoft 365 Security and Compliance, and Microsoft 365 Copilot
Microsoft 365 Commercial seat growth The number of Microsoft 365 Commercial seats at end of period where seats are paid users covered by a Microsoft 365 Commercial subscription
Microsoft 365 Consumer cloud revenue growth Revenue from Microsoft 365 Consumer subscriptions and other consumer services
Microsoft 365 Consumer subscribers The number of Microsoft 365 Consumer subscribers at end of period
LinkedIn revenue growth Revenue from LinkedIn, including Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions, Premium Subscriptions, and Sales Solutions
Dynamics 365 revenue growth Revenue from Dynamics 365, including a set of intelligent, cloud-based applications across ERP, CRM, Power Apps, and Power Automate
Azure and other cloud services revenue growth Revenue from Azure and other cloud services, including cloud and AI consumption-based services, GitHub cloud services, Nuance Healthcare cloud services, virtual desktop offerings, and other cloud services
Windows OEM and Devices revenue growth Revenue from sales of Windows Pro and non-Pro licenses sold through the OEM channel and sales of first-party Devices, including Surface and PC accessories
Xbox content and services revenue growth Revenue from Xbox content and services, comprising first- and third-party content (including games and in-game content), Xbox Game Pass and other subscriptions, Xbox Cloud Gaming, advertising, and other cloud services
Commercial remaining performance obligation Commercial portion of revenue allocated to remaining performance obligations, which includes unearned revenue and amounts that will be invoiced and recognized as revenue in future periods
Microsoft Cloud revenue and revenue growth Revenue from Microsoft 365 Commercial cloud, Azure and other cloud services, the commercial portion of LinkedIn, and Dynamics 365
Microsoft Cloud gross margin percentage Gross margin percentage for our Microsoft Cloud business
seat vs consumption / usage-based pricing mix shift
Azure revenue is mainly affected by infrastructure-as-a-service and platform-as-a-service consumption-based services.
Azure is a comprehensive set of cloud services that offer developers, IT professionals, and enterprises freedom to build, deploy, and manage applications on any platform or device.
Azure AI offerings provide a competitive advantage as companies seek ways to optimize and scale their business with AI.
We offer supercomputing power for AI at scale to run large workloads, complemented by our rapidly expanding portfolio of AI cloud services (including the latest models) and hardware, which includes custom-built silicon and strong partnerships with chip manufacturers.
Azure AI Foundry is a unified platform for developers to design, customize, and manage AI applications and agents.
Server products revenue is mainly affected by purchases through volume licensing programs, licenses sold to OEMs, and retail packaged products.
CALs provide access rights to certain server products, including SQL Server and Windows Server, and revenue is reported along with the associated server product.
GitHub and Nuance Healthcare include both cloud and on-premises offerings.
Azure faces diverse competition from cloud service providers and open source offerings.
Azure’s competitive advantage includes enabling a hybrid cloud, allowing deployment of existing datacenters with our public cloud into a single, cohesive infrastructure, and the ability to run at a scale that meets the needs of businesses of all sizes and complexities.
Our AI offerings compete with AI products from hyperscalers, as well as products from other emerging competitors and other open source offerings, many of which are also current or potential partners.
Our Azure Security offerings include our cloud security solution and security information and event management solution, which compete with providers in the cybersecurity and cloud security space.
competitive displacement / win-loss / platform consolidation
Azure faces diverse competition from cloud service providers and open source offerings.
Azure’s competitive advantage includes enabling a hybrid cloud, allowing deployment of existing datacenters with our public cloud into a single, cohesive infrastructure, and the ability to run at a scale that meets the needs of businesses of all sizes and complexities.
Our AI offerings compete with AI products from hyperscalers, as well as products from other emerging competitors and other open source offerings, many of which are also current or potential partners.
Our Azure Security offerings include our cloud security solution and security information and event management solution, which compete with providers in the cybersecurity and cloud security space.
Our server products face competition from a wide variety of server operating systems and applications offered by companies with a range of market approaches.
Vertically integrated computer manufacturers offer their own versions of the Unix operating system preinstalled on server hardware and nearly all computer manufacturers offer server hardware for the Linux operating system.
We compete to provide enterprise-wide computing and point solutions with numerous commercial software vendors that offer solutions and middleware technology platforms, software applications for connectivity, security, hosting, database, and e-business servers.
Our database, business intelligence, and data warehousing solutions offerings compete with products from providers in the data and analytics industry.
Our system management solutions compete with server management and server virtualization platform providers.
Our products for software developers compete against offerings from major technology providers, as well as open source alternatives.
Our Enterprise and partner services business competes with a wide range of companies that provide strategy and business planning, application development, and infrastructure services, including multinational consulting firms and small niche businesses focused on specific technologies.
AI product monetisation / attach
The filing names this beat, but no statement in it verified as a verbatim quote, so none is reported here.
guidance raised/cut, outlook change
Advertising expense was $2.1 billion, $1.7 billion, and $904 million in fiscal years 2025, 2024, and 2023, respectively.
Advertising expense was $2.1 billion, $1.7 billion, and $904 million in fiscal years 2025, 2024, and 2023, respectively.
Advertising expense was $2.1 billion, $1.7 billion, and $904 million in fiscal years 2025, 2024, and 2023, respectively.
cost action / restructuring / headcount
Research and development expenses include payroll, employee benefits, stock-based compensation expense, and other headcount-related expenses associated with product development.
Sales and marketing expenses include payroll, employee benefits, stock-based compensation expense, and other headcount-related expenses associated with sales and marketing personnel, and the costs of advertising, promotions, trade shows, seminars, and other programs.
General and administrative expenses include payroll, employee benefits, stock-based compensation expense, employee severance expense incurred as part of a corporate program, and other headcount-related expenses associated with finance, legal, facilities, certain human resources and other administrative personnel, certain taxes, and legal and other administrative fees.
Verification ledger
- 42 statements proposed by the extractor
- 41 verified verbatim against the fetched filing (98%)
- 1 discarded — not quotable character-for-character
The verbatim check contains no model: the extractor proposes a statement, and a deterministic substring match against the fetched text decides whether it is admissible. A proposal that does not verify is dropped.
This brief publishes no inference and no synthesis. The publication's inference layer must clear a measured second-lab confirmation threshold before it may appear; it has not, so it is absent by rule rather than by omission.