SUDBURY, Mass., Nov. 1, 2026 — Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon now depreciate their servers over 6 years, up from 3 in 2019, according to a CIOPages analysis of 33 annual reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The companies' own filings put the first-year profit effect of 12 such extensions, made by six companies between 2020 and 2025, at $27.4 billion.
Key findings:
- In 2019, Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon depreciated servers over 3 years. By 2024, all three used 6. Meta now uses 5.5 years for most servers and network assets; Oracle and CoreWeave use 6.
- Each change lowered depreciation and raised reported profit. The first-year effects disclosed in the companies' 10-K filings total $27.4 billion across 12 extensions.
- In 2022, Amazon's longer server life cut depreciation by $3.6 billion, equal to 29% of that year's operating income of $12.25 billion.
- Amazon is the only company in the analysis to shorten. Effective January 1, 2025, it moved a subset of servers and networking equipment from 6 years to 5, citing "the increased pace of technology development, particularly in the area of artificial intelligence and machine learning."
- Nvidia, which says it works on a one-year rhythm, has announced the H200, Blackwell, Blackwell Ultra and Rubin since the H100 in March 2022. A server placed in service in 2023 and depreciated over 6 years stays on the books through four of those launches and a fifth that is planned.
- Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Oracle spent $464.6 billion on property and equipment in their latest fiscal year, up from $71.1 billion in fiscal 2019.
The analysis does not show that any company misstated its accounts. Useful life is a management estimate, reviewed by auditors, and each change was disclosed. Depreciation does not change cash flow.
The report, Deep Dive 01 in a new monthly CIOPages series, includes charts of each company's useful-life history, the stated effect of every change, a comparison with Nvidia's product cadence, and the arithmetic of a shorter life. A free download includes the full report as a PDF and a data workbook with the 10-K passages, financials from 2019 and a model readers can use to test other useful lives.
The report is free to read at https://www.ciopages.com/deep-dives/big-tech-server-depreciation.
About CIOPages
CIOPages (https://www.ciopages.com) publishes independent research, buyer's guides, tools and data for CIOs, CTOs and enterprise architects. Its articles and analysis are written without vendor sponsorship. CIOPages is a Capstera property.
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