GW 2026 Full Year Financial Report (JUST Out, 1st Impressions on Page 1)

[N1SB]

1st Update: it came out maybe hours ago, I (and apparently Brother Waaagh)'ve been reading it since: https://assets.ctfassets.net/ost7hseic9hc/6nI9MLA7hoRBfs2OA1oE5R/5b0fef99d81995ba1cdf872887f6cbe6/Results_Statement_2025-26_FINAL_v2.pdf

 

How time flies.  We've broken down GW's financials for a decade now, when GW hockey-sticked up around 8th ed 40k's launch.

 

As always, we enter with a mindset of "you oughta know where your food comes from" as a U.S. Midwestern farmer once told me.

 

Keep in mind this report measures from the time of Horus Heresy 3.0 to JUST BEFORE 40k 11th ed.  I haven't even played 11th ed yet.

 

PREVIEW: we are using their last Half-Yearly Report as an indicator, I will ADD NEW POSTS once the Full-Year report comes out.

 

 

+++ Preview: TOP-LINE RESULTS +++

 

You always hear about "the bottom line", meaning (operating) profit, because corporations "maximise profit," "line must go up," etc.

 

While it's true the spice must flow because the economy is built on having some forward motion, "top-line", or revenue, is more interesting to us as a proxy to the popularity of The Hobby.  It's a measure of people x how much they're willing to spend...because they have spent it, the ultimate test.  We can preview the Full-Year results from the Half-Year results:

 

 

• Core revenue means GW's own stuff: miniatures, games, paints, etc.
• Licensing revenue means royalties from video games and JoyToys, etc., NOT GW's own stuff

 

FORECAST: GW's Full Year revenue should be around £700 million, a bit more than 2x GW's Half Year, because there's always a Christmas bump.

 

To compare, Magic: the Gathering annual revenue is $1.72 BILLION, almost double GW.  WotC prints money, and props up all of its parent, Hasbro.

 

Fun Fact: unless you get a Space Marine II or something, licensing revenue is consistently around 5% of GW's core revenue.  It's like if The Hobby itself is in good shape, video game companies will license 40k.  Here, the horse is leading the cart: if GW wants to grow its licensing revenue, they should focus on popularising its OWN offerings (by making better miniatures, games, stories, etc.), then the licensees will come.

 

This year was a Horus Heresy launch year, so was HH 3.0 the "hero" that drove core revenue growth?  Turns out it was something different...

 

 

+++ Preview: Where Was the Growth, Pricing Update Red Flag +++

 

The following is from the Half-Year report, and it'll be interesting to see how much it'll change by Full-Year, will update:

 

 

• Trade means 3rd party sellers like Friendly Local Gaming Stores or non-GW online stores
• Retail means Warhammer Stores
• Online means GW's own online store

 

So if it was a product (or general growth) that drove sales, you'd see the same growth across sales channels, because it's the same product everywhere.  So if HH 3.0 was really that popular, you'd see it drive sales in Trade (like FLGSs), Retail (Warhammer Stores) and Online (warhammer.com) all around the same level.

 

Instead, we saw Trade grow by +25% while only around 5% (basically just inflation) elsewhere.  I expect an explanation from the Half-Year report:

 

 

Welp, thank you for the explanation, Miss Group Financial Director!  GW increased 3rd party Trade vendors BY 500 to 8,600 (thx Rusted Boltgun for correcting me), but now I wonder how does that about 6% increase translate to 25.2%?  Like I guess existing trade outlets might be buying much more, but that seems off, doesn't it?

 

I guess THIS is a factor of Warhammer's popularity from other sources, like Space Marine II or Amazon shows.  Here it's a bit of the cart leading the horse.  For those that said video games/streaming will drive The Hobby, it turns out the main thing they drove is 3rd parties to carry more Warhammer products.

 

The thing we're watching for is the core gross margin.  GW expects a core gross margin of 70%: you buy $100 of stuff, it cost GW $30 to make, $70 is profit.  That's only for that box of miniatures, paints, etc., and would not include the costs of running the Warhammer Store you bought it from, etc. (and what that $70 pays for).

 

Fun Fact: there's a Director in GW whose job is to keep the core gross margin at 70%...thus keeping prices low.  That job sucks right now, because geopolitical events have driven costs up, from the the plastic that is an oil-related byproduct to the energy costs of melting said plastic into molds to form miniatures.

 

Last year, I mentioned tariffs from the U.S. would be passed onto Hobbyists worldwide, as tariffs are paid when a product enters a country, before it's sold to the consumer.  That decrease of -1.8% suggests the US market is about 18% of GW's business.  (Bolt)gun to my head, I'd've estimated 20% before, as I knew North America was about about 40% overall, like US would be half of all NA.  Turns out it's a little bit lower than that, which was interesting to me.

 

The last pricing update came in October 2025, before the Half-Year report.  How the core gross margin drops will be a red flag on how big a price hike to come.

 

 

+++ Preview: Factory 4 and Why Change Drop Pods/Baneblade +++

 

The most confusing thing to me as of late is, why change the Drop Pod and, recently, the Baneblade.

 

The Baneblade could be some shady profit motive, but why bother?  It's not something everyone buys and what they did is take out certain weapon options to sell separately, so GW won't make much from that.  The Drop Pod was the really confusing one and was a red flag...it's like they're just looking for ways to make them faster.

 

A new cast for something like the Drop Pod isn't costless, it should be within £100,000, so it's like a hard-thought/fought decision.

 

I think it's how GW production has trouble keeping up with demand.  GW has kept its same 3 Factories...with improvements...but is producing 5x more product.  The most precious resource in GW right now is time on the factory floor.  GW hasn't really addressed it yet, and likely they'll spin it as increased efficiency, but I wanna know.

 

 

+++ Preview: We Await the Full-Year Report +++

 

It should come with this week, maybe next week at the latest, because GW has increasingly more money to count.

 

The main interesting thing is how licensed games like Space Marine II drove sales mainly by making 3rd party partners interested, and I expect that Half-Year's Trade's (i.e. FLGS) 25% growth to grow even more by the Full-Year.  It's about growing The Hobby from the OUTside, not just upselling to existing players/painters.

 

The bad thing is I expect GW's costs to have ballooned, just all of ours have, and they'll have to increase their own prices to keep up.

 

So I'll be back in this thread, updating this post, reading your replies, later this week or early next...should be.

Edited July 28 by N1SB

[Jukkiz]

"A new cast for something like the Drop Pod isn't costless"

Yet they keep making one time models yearly, sometimes 4-5 per year aswell. Sold once, never again. Which balloons their costs without real profit back at them. Some old onetime models could easily be kept on made to order or just regular stock to cover some of the lost Casting costs.

[Rusted Boltgun]

It reads as trade accounts increased by 500 to 8,600 not fromm 500

[Emperor Ming]

So in short:

 

[phandaal]

I expect the usual - GW made so much money from Primaris Lieutenants that they are now able to buy yachts for their butlers' butlers.

[N1SB]

2 hours ago, Rusted Boltgun said:

It reads as trade accounts increased by 500 to 8,600 not fromm 500

 

Oh man, you're right, I misread that totally, but now I'm also wondering how that 6%ish added would lead to a 25.2% increase, y'know?  I know the guy who was the Trade Accounts guy in Hong Kong, one of the locales listed, but he left about a year or so ago.  They seem to have a whole new, and I guess better, system.

[Rusted Boltgun]

Apologies @N1SB that was a really abrupt post by me earlier, I was on the move at the time. I really appreciate the dives that you do into the financials. It is so interesting to 'follow the money ' and see how GW moves over time.

[N1SB]

4 hours ago, Jukkiz said:

"A new cast for something like the Drop Pod isn't costless"

Yet they keep making one time models yearly, sometimes 4-5 per year aswell. Sold once, never again. Which balloons their costs without real profit back at them. Some old onetime models could easily be kept on made to order or just regular stock to cover some of the lost Casting costs.

 

Hey, this is another thing I learned from Timperial Guard, who had worked in plastic injection moulding.

 

So GW miniatures are very detailed.  He pointed out to capture that level of detail, they need some extra high-grade die-cast mold, something like that.  Those last (effectively) forever, like to have that granularity of detail, you have to have a very strong mold.  So yeah, they could keep churning out those models if they wanted to, they don't even wear down.

[lansalt]

Thanks for your great work @N1SB!
Do you have an updated graph that shows the evolution of GW's revenue and profits? I remember you posting it on previous occassions, and I though it was very useful to understand GW's performance over the years at a glance.

[MoriyaSchism]

Since they are so well off they should start paying the people who blindly defend them on this forum. 

13 hours ago, N1SB said:

 

+++ Factory 4 and Why Change Drop Pods/Baneblade +++

 

The most confusing thing to me as of late is, why change the Drop Pod and, recently, the Baneblade.

 

The Baneblade could be some shady profit motive, but why bother?  It's not something everyone buys and what they did is take out certain weapon options to sell separately, so GW won't make much from that.  The Drop Pod was the really confusing one and was a red flag...it's like they're just looking for ways to make them faster.

 

A new cast for something like the Drop Pod isn't costless, it should be within £100,000, so it's like a hard-thought/fought decision.

 

I think it's how GW production has trouble keeping up with demand.  GW has kept its same 3 Factories...with improvements...but is producing 5x more product.  The most precious resource in GW right now is time on the factory floor.  GW hasn't really addressed it yet, and likely they'll spin it as increased efficiency, but I wanna know.

The Baneblade change and the "updated" Drop Pod are just more proof that Games Workshop as a company is just horrible. Perhaps they shouldn't make new expensive machinery for really subpar products. Maybe they wouldn't have to try and nickle and dime people in underhanded ways if they didn't do this sort of nonsense. 

 

Games Workshop's quality control has gone down in recent years. I got some of the first sprues for the Space Wolves when they got their refresh and I was shocked by the flash and spillover on some detail like the armour panel lines on the back of the legs. There's also the case of Titus and his retinue being one of the worst releases in terms of product quality recently. Their customer service seems quite busy recently because it took 4 weeks for them to sort out the completely ruined Armageddon models I got. The quality of some of the sculptors they hired in the past 10 years leaves a lot to desire as well, I recently found the Instagram profile of the guy who worked on the Space Marine side of Armageddon and the Ferren Areios. I can't say I'm impressed by his private artwork and his output at Games Workshop. The company is making money, but the product itself is on decline on all fronts. People can argue that's a matter of taste, but I think signs of a quality decline are all there.

[Jukkiz]

Some kit, ahem "upgrades" i get.

But this new age of legs and torso together, everything seemingly more round and bigger just yells more profits with easier molds and cost cutting. While yes, most can argue for more dynamic posing and easier building, it just seems weird that something like defiler is now more like egg on legs, rather then tankturret on legs. 

Each their own but it is seemingly quite weird direction to me atleast. Cad sculpting is making models like marines seem really lazy at times and repeated poses of same kit, in multiple marine armies is jarring. 

[Lord_Ikka]

20 hours ago, Jukkiz said:

"A new cast for something like the Drop Pod isn't costless"

Yet they keep making one time models yearly, sometimes 4-5 per year aswell. Sold once, never again. Which balloons their costs without real profit back at them. Some old onetime models could easily be kept on made to order or just regular stock to cover some of the lost Casting costs.

The one-time models typically come in three flavors- Store Opening/Anniversary models, Event/Yearly models (think 30th year anniversary or Xmas models), and Warhammer+ models. 

Let's look at the 2025 exclusive models:

Store Anniversary - Biosigns Terminated (40k), Estenna of Brighthall (AoS) 

Event/Yearly - First of the Faithful (40k for Adepticon), Clawlord Kettek Throatbite (Aos Adepticon), Tinboy (Xmas), Urkhan the Dark Warden (Warhammer Day), Captain Centos (200th NA store)

WH+ - Infinity's Lament (40k), the Summons (AoS)

 

That is 9 sprues total- which seems about average for the past 5 years or so. As for cost, they are usually all priced around the normal cost for characters, so in the $35-50 range. They aren't priced extremely high, so GW isn't exactly price-gouging for them, but there are some valid reasons to do the one-off productions. Exclusive anything leads to FOMO and hype, which can lead to higher sales of other kits. Similar to a grocery store loss-leader item, these one-off exclusives lead to higher traffic to GW-direct sales, as none of these exclusive minis are available outside of GW directly. So even if you just want the yearly store exclusive, you have to go to a Warhammer store and order it, so why not pick up something else at the same time? Taking a small hit on producing 10 or so character kits each year might be worth it for GW if it increases their overall sales. It could also be that they simply get enough sales from the one-offs that it covers the production cost, maybe by having all of the one-offs in a combined mold (I'm not up on injection-molding tech, but the size of character sprues is roughly half of a squad's sprue, so maybe they are able to run them in a different way?).

 

GW has also done MTO for previously exclusive models; for example in 2023 they had a MTO for the Primaris Company Champion, which had been an Event Exclusive the previous year. I don't typically stay up on MTO offers, so I don't know/remember if it happened again, but it does show that they can and will do more runs of one-offs if there is enough demand.

[Waaagh?]

All I got from the article is they have MIKE :cuss:ING FLANNIGAN on board for the Amazon stuff!

[Mr Farson]

20 years ago they explained that character moulds were done using cheaper moulds because they didn't need to turn as many out. They quoted something like 6k at the time or 10 percent of a regular mould in the WD that talked about it.

 

I imagine it's still the case now where these limited edition pieces are cast in these cheaper moulds. If they weren't turning a profit on it they wouldn't bother 

[N1SB]

I expected GW's Full-Year Financial Report to come out later this week, they released it the NEXT day.  Gimme a break, GW.

 

 

+++ 1st Impressions: TOP-LINE RESULTS +++

 

 

• Core revenue means GW's own stuff: miniatures, games, paints, etc.
• Licensing revenue means royalties from video games...like SPACE MARINE II

 

(I colour-coded it to be like a Balance Dataslate, because it's actually really efficient.)

 

BOTH of the following are true.  1st, it IS another GW peak.  2nd, it is ALSO a slight plateauing off from an exceptional year.

 

Last year was the release of the video game Space Marine II.  Give you a comparison.  Street Fighter 6 sold 7 million copies.  It's about to take centre-stage in the Esports World Cup tomorrow.  A film with DC/WWE/podcast stars is coming.  Space Marine II sold almost double that, now at 12 million units.

 

Space Marine II didn't just bring licensing revenue (which is awesome because it's like Mortal Wounds; there's no costs like there's no cover saves, it goes through as sheer profit like sheer damage), but it unlocked a new wave of 1st time Hobbyists; they've heard of 40k, but now want to act on it.

 

It really wasn't going to repeat until maybe a Space Marine III.  I hope but am unsure it can repeat even with Total War:hammer 40k tbh.

 

 

+++ 1st Impressions: Growth In the Same Place, Just Less So +++

 

In my initial post, I mentioned 30k wasn't as much as hero as FLGSs/3rd parties, known as "Trade", at +25.2%.

 

That Trade channel dropped to 17.2% stretched out the whole year.  The other "Channels" (GW's own) also fell.

 

Question for you guys pls: what happened in the 2nd half of the year?  Starting December to May.  Did we all wait for 11th ed?

 

 

+++ 1st Impressions: Pricing Update Red Flag Lowered...for NOW +++

 

Good news is there probably won't be another pricing update this year.  Bad news is it's 'cos they ALREADY overcharged/over-cut corners.

 

TL;DR is - GW operated as if the U.S. tariffs were real and adjusted their business to fit.  Even though they got overturned, they think they'll be back.

 

 

GW hovers at a core gross margin of 70%: $100's worth of minis/paints/books in a haul averages out to costing GW $30 to make.  They fight hard for each FRACTION of a percent, have like 10 annual projects that shave off like 0.1% each...which gets cancelled out by like a 1% increase in Covid-related costs.

 

U.S. tariffs are 10% for U.K. goods.  We found they're about 18% of GW's sales.  That's the 1.8% in the initial post, from their Half-Year results in JANUARY 2026.  Because tariffs are charged "over the rails" (actually a technical term, like the ship's railing so you don't fall over).

 

For a company that is sweating every 0.1% here, 0.1% there, overnight they hard to deal with a 1.8% change.  GW was already planning things like its pricing updates, shown here as the 0.2% "price rises", that took effect in October 2025.  This whopping change to cost of good sold is an unprecedented 1.6%.

 

Cost of goods sold can EXACTLY be a downgraded Drop Pod and Baneblade with missing parts.  I've only seen it at like 0.1% efficiency increases before.

 

(Technically tariffs go into a cost of goods sold figure, but people can separate it out for clarity, they're not fudging numbers.  It's not like Power Levels.)

 

The U.S. Supreme Court "struck down" those U.S. tariffs in FEBRUARY 2026, but it's like GW was already planning around them.

 

Had the U.S. Supreme Court NOT "struck down" those U.S. tariffs, that'd be 71.1% - 1.8% = 69.3%, a little bit lower than what they were last year.

 

I lay this out before you hear some YouTuber say this is GW "greedflation".  "Greedflation" WOULD be if GW dramatically increased prices over their costs.  But they show they were technically targeting that 10% the U.S. government charge 18% of our Fraters, that the rest of us are fronting money to help.

 

Warhammer example - the tariffs are like when a Balance Dataslate just screwed your army over by making your best unit go overpoints, so you try to cut almost EXACTLY the points from somewhere else so you can still play with a legal list, but it never quite equates...and you're waiting for the NEXT nerf.

 

(And that's how I ended up with a Royal Warden as my HQ for my Triple C'tan list.)

 

 

Btw, it's not like GW even has all the money back yet.  There's a mechanism where you have to "sue" a specific U.S. department to stake your claim.

 

Oh and if GW does another pricing update in lieu of this, and it's not, say, due to rising energy/oil-related byproducts like plastic, I WILL call greedflation.

 

Now I go to bed!  A bit angry!

Edited July 28 by N1SB

[alfred_the_great]

And in the interim, POTUS has re-announced tariffs, so probably sensible GW baked them in. 

[WBRBloom]

Thanks a bunch, @N1SB! This is really amazing work!

[Cactus]

Quote

The other one this year was in May 2026, we missed by £1.5 million, that still hurts. That was due to a poor execution of our plan in the  final week of the year. The operational directors were distracted by the detailed planning for the launch of the 11th edition of Warhammer  40,000 in June 2026. But still, no excuses, lessons have been learnt.

 

Here Rountree is talking about failing to achieve year-on-year sales growth in two months this year.

 

What should have been driving growth in sales in May that underperformed or didn't happen? Perhaps there never were any signed copies of Hive and that caused the sudden reversal over the release.

[Arikel]

On 7/28/2026 at 9:14 AM, N1SB said:

 

 

Question for you guys pls: what happened in the 2nd half of the year?  Starting December to May.  Did we all wait for 11th ed?

 

 

++

Hahaha is that sarcasm ? Or you really not sure? 

 

Quick breakdown at least for me what happened after chrismas, in case you seriously don’t know.

 

I live in rural Quebec, roughly an hour from eveything. I would say I drive between 500 to 1000 KM a week. Gas went from 1.30 per liter march 1rst to 1.90 + 2 weeks later and stayed there for months in my area, so well over a 40% increase.  The lowest it got since then was 1.70 before it started trending back up 2 weeks ago (currently at 1.80 for me now). Diesel, which the majority of transport vehicles use, also went up, which then drove up other volatile trade goods like food rather quickly as well. So not only did my full tank of gas go from 60 ish to almost $90, all the other basics started pushing up too. For people with limited incomes, this really bites into your hobby and entertainment budget, so someone like myself who put aside say 400 a month, but gases up 2 times a week (living an hour away from everywhere sucks) would need an extra 240 a month just for the gas increase alone, and then some additional money towards rapidly increasing food costs as well.

 

Keep in mind that’s not 400 for GW, but what’s budgeted for “entertainment” so that covers streaming tv and game services, restaurant and take out food, toys, games, and trips for kids etc etc. Taking the extra gas costs cuts that to 160, then down to a $100 as food rises to match. Once netflix, disney, and the game pass comes off, We’re down to maybe $40 to spend on fun stuff for everybody for the month.

 

I can tell you it feels both insane and soul crushing to see how rapidly one can go from all the bases are covered with enough left to have some fun to scrounging up spare change from around the house to pay for necessities because you ran out of bread and milk 2 days before money comes in.

 

Now I normally don’t feel poor. But the price jumps are definitely becoming enough to hit not just those who were already broke, but those who were at the “well I still have money left after i pay all the bills to have some fun every month“ just don’t have it anymore, we aren’t able to buy anything.

 

Now many warhammer folk do tend to be on the wealthier side, but not all of them are wealthy enough to keep buying at the rate they were before with the recent increases in price in the “you need it to live” items over the past 5 months

 

[kabaakaba]

I'm in almost the same situation, but I have to travel 200 km to civilization. Our gasoline price went from $0.50 to $0.75. But all other prices rose even more. And with the mortgage and current payments, the hobby budget hit rock bottom and beyond. It seems to me that for many people the situation is even worse. Many of my Warhammer fans have also stopped buying. On the other hand, it's actually a good thing; people are starting to clear out their piles of opportunities.