Qualcomm has reported fiscal fourth-quarter results that topped Wall Street expectations for both earnings per share and revenue, even though forecasts had already anticipated a steep year-over-year decline.

Heading into the report, analysts expected non-GAAP EPS of about $2.16, which would have marked a drop of roughly 28% from the $3.00 posted in the same quarter a year earlier. Revenue forecasts stood near $10.15 billion, compared with $11.27 billion in the year-ago period — a slide of approximately 10%.

The fiscal Q4 report had been scheduled for release on November 4, 2026, after the market close.

Handsets in focus

The segment drawing the closest scrutiny was handsets, the business that has long served as Qualcomm's main earnings engine. Handset revenue was projected at about $5.2 billion for the quarter — roughly half of the ~$10.15 billion total revenue forecast — and would represent a significant year-over-year decline. That weighting is why the phone business remains the number to watch: the pace of its contraction, measured against growth in non-handset lines, is the clearest gauge of how far Qualcomm's push beyond smartphones has progressed.

Several pressures weigh on the phone business. Qualcomm has been losing modem orders from Apple as the iPhone maker moves toward its own chip designs. Demand for Android devices has also been subdued. Rising memory costs have squeezed phone makers and the components they buy, while supply chain issues affecting the smartphone and PC markets have added another layer of friction.

Fiscal Q3 set the template

The pattern echoes the prior quarter. In fiscal Q3 2026, Qualcomm reported revenue of $9.95 billion, comfortably ahead of the roughly $9.67 billion analysts had expected, though the figure still represented a 4% decline from a year earlier. Non-GAAP EPS came in at $2.21, a hair below the consensus estimate of $2.23.

Automotive was the bright spot in Q3. Qualcomm posted record automotive revenue of $1.59 billion, up 61% year over year, and its non-handset segments as a whole grew 28% year over year in the quarter. Those figures set the yardstick for the fiscal Q4 print: handset contraction on one side, and the durability of non-handset growth on the other.

The diversification bet

Qualcomm's strategy is to reduce its dependence on smartphones by pushing into data centers, automotive, and the Internet of Things. Management expects non-handset revenue to grow by more than 60% in fiscal 2027. As the final quarterly reading of fiscal 2026, the Q4 report supplies the baseline for that target, with the data center, automotive, and IoT line items showing how much ground there is to cover.

Disclosure: The original report was published by CryptoBriefing and edited by Vivian Nguyen.

Source: CryptoBriefing