DraftKings Revenue Drops 5% to $1.4 Billion in Q2 2026 Despite 15% Betting Volume Surge
DraftKings posted Q2 2026 revenue of $1.4 billion, down 5% year-over-year, even as betting volume surged 15% and the company kept its full-year guidance intact.
DraftKings reported second-quarter 2026 revenue of $1.443 billion on Thursday, a decline of $69 million, or 5%, from the $1.513 billion it posted in the same period a year earlier. The miss came even as the sportsbook operator’s underlying business kept growing, with handle, active users, and engagement all trending upward heading into the back half of the year.
The gap between top-line revenue and the company’s actual betting activity tells the real story. Sports Consumer Volume, DraftKings’ measure of total betting action, jumped 15% year-over-year to $13.1 billion, up from $11.5 billion in the second quarter of 2025. Revenue fell anyway because the sports themselves didn’t cooperate — customer-friendly outcomes across the quarter created an estimated $80 million headwind, compounded by increased promotional spending tied to new customer acquisition on both the Sportsbook and the newer Predictions product.
Sportsbook Margins Take the Hit While iGaming Keeps Climbing
Sports betting revenue came in at $892 million for the quarter, with a net revenue margin of 6.8% — down sharply from 8.7% in the prior-year period. That compression is squarely a function of the sports results going the customers’ way rather than any structural weakness in the betting business; volume and user growth actually accelerated. DraftKings’ iGaming segment, by contrast, kept its steady climb, posting $462 million in revenue and continuing a growth trend that has held every quarter since early 2022.
Monthly Unique Payers rose 9% year-over-year to 3.6 million, and unique customers over the trailing twelve months reached 10.5 million, up from 10.4 million a year earlier. On a GAAP basis, DraftKings posted a diluted loss per share of $0.14, while adjusted diluted earnings per share came in at $0.09 — below the $0.11 Wall Street had modeled, alongside a revenue miss against the $1.55 billion consensus estimate. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter landed at $115 million.
Robins Points to the Super App and a Fast-Growing Predictions Business
“We delivered a strong second quarter and enter the back half of the year with real momentum, as our core business grew across handle, users, and engagement,” DraftKings CEO and co-founder Jason Robins said in a statement. “Our Super App is now live nationwide, and Predictions is already growing faster than we anticipated.”
CFO Alan Ellingson struck a similar tone on guidance, noting that the core business remains on track to generate roughly $1 billion in Adjusted EBITDA this year — cash flow the company says gives it room to keep funding its push into prediction markets. DraftKings confirmed it plans to invest an incremental $200 million to $300 million into Predictions through the rest of fiscal 2026, betting that the category becomes a meaningful growth driver alongside its traditional sportsbook and casino lines.
Despite the earnings and revenue misses, DraftKings kept its full-year 2026 guidance unchanged — revenue of $6.5 billion to $6.9 billion and Adjusted EBITDA of $700 million to $900 million, the same range the company set back on May 7. Shares moved higher in premarket trading following the report, suggesting investors were more focused on the 15% jump in betting volume and the nationwide Super App rollout than on a quarter where the sports simply didn’t break DraftKings’ way. For bettors tracking which operators are leaning hardest into new markets, DraftKings’ continued investment lines up with active DraftKings promo code offers still running for new users across legal states.
What It Means Heading Into Football Season
The timing matters. DraftKings’ second quarter closes out the slower stretch of the sports calendar before football season — historically the company’s biggest revenue driver — kicks back in. A 15% surge in betting volume during a comparatively quiet quarter, paired with unchanged full-year guidance, suggests DraftKings isn’t worried about one unlucky quarter of sports outcomes derailing its trajectory. The bigger question industry-watchers will track through the fall is whether Predictions can scale quickly enough to become a genuine third leg for the company alongside sports betting and iGaming, or whether it remains a smaller side bet inside a business still driven overwhelmingly by traditional wagering.