Microsoft announced that Bing has reached 1 billion monthly active users for the first time. CEO Satya Nadella revealed this figure during the Q3 FY2026 earnings call.
Revenue from search ads, excluding traffic acquisition costs, increased by 12% year over year. Additionally, Edge has maintained its browser market share for 20 consecutive quarters.
Overall, Microsoft reported total revenue of $82.9 billion for the quarter, marking an 18% increase.
Search & Advertising
The segment that includes Bing was down 1% overall at $13.2 billion. Search advertising was the bright spot, with CFO Amy Hood pointing to higher volume and revenue per search.
Nadella was direct about where the consumer business stands:
“When it comes to our consumer business, we are doing the foundational work required to win back fans and strengthen engagement across Windows, Xbox, Bing, and Edge. In the near term, we are focused on fundamentals, prioritizing quality and serving our core users better.”
Search ad growth has held in double digits for three straight quarters. It grew 16% in Q1 FY2026, 10% in Q2, and 12% this quarter. For Q4, Microsoft guided that growth to the high single digits, a step down.
Back in 2023, Microsoft reported 100 million daily active users when it first added AI to Bing. Going from 100 million daily to 1 billion monthly is a big jump, though it’s unclear whether Copilot interactions count toward that number.
Edge is part of the story, too. It typically defaults to Bing, so five years of Edge growth means more people landing on Bing without actively choosing it.
Why This Matters
Edge has gained share for five straight years, and search ad revenue has grown in double digits for three consecutive quarters.
Microsoft has also been building the measurement tools to go with it. Bing Webmaster Tools now maps grounding queries to cited pages, and Microsoft previewed Citation Share at SEO Week earlier this month.
Still, Bing’s global search share sits at about 5% worldwide per StatCounter’s March 2026 data. That gap between 1 billion MAU and 5% share suggests a lot of those users are low-frequency or showing up through default settings rather than choosing Bing.
Looking Ahead
Microsoft’s next earnings call will show whether search ad growth picks back up or settles into single digits.
The Citation Share feature Microsoft previewed at SEO Week hasn’t shipped yet. When it does, it could be the first tool for tracking how your site’s AI visibility on Bing compares to competitors.
