Bilibili Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
May 19, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Bilibili posted solid Q1 growth, with total revenue up 7% year over year to RMB 7.5 billion, gross margin expanding to 37.1%, and adjusted net profit rising 62% to RMB 585 million. Management highlighted this as the 15th consecutive quarter of margin expansion.
  • Positive Sentiment: User engagement remained very strong, as DAUs increased 8% to 115 million, MAUs reached 376 million, and average daily time spent hit a record 119 minutes, up 11 minutes year over year. Management said the platform’s high-quality content and community remain the core growth engine.
  • Positive Sentiment: Advertising was a standout business, with revenue up 30% year over year to RMB 2.6 billion, supported by stronger performance across brand, performance, and creator ads. The company said AI-driven targeting and automated ad tools improved efficiency, while non-mobile ad scenarios like PC, OTT, search, and mini-programs also accelerated.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Gaming revenue declined 12% year over year to RMB 1.5 billion, mainly due to a tough comparison against last year’s strong Sanmo launch. Management pointed to a pipeline of new titles, including Three Kingdoms N-card, Sanwang, and Lumi Master, as future growth drivers.
  • Positive Sentiment: AI is becoming a key strategic investment across video understanding, recommendation, and creation, with management saying it is already boosting engagement and monetization. For 2026, Bilibili expects about RMB 1 billion of AI-related CapEx and around RMB 500 million of P&L impact, while still targeting long-term gross margin of 40% to 45% and operating profit margin of 15% to 20%.
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Earnings Conference Call
Bilibili Q1 2026
00:00 / 00:00

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Operator

Good day, and welcome to Bilibili's first quarter 2026 financial results and business update conference call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Juliet Yang, executive director of investor relations. Please go ahead.

Juliet Yang
Juliet Yang
Executive Director of Investor Relations at Bilibili

Thank you, operator. During this call, we'll discuss our business outlook and make forward-looking statements. These comments are based on our predictions and expectations as of today. Actual events or results could differ materially from those mentioned in today's news release and in this discussion due to a number of risks and uncertainties, including those mentioned in our most recent filing with SEC and Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The non-GAAP financial measure we provide are for comparison purpose only. The definition of this measure and the reconciliation table are available in the news release we issued earlier today. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. An investor presentation and a webcast replay of this conference call will be available on the Bilibili IR website at ir.bilibili.com.

Juliet Yang
Juliet Yang
Executive Director of Investor Relations at Bilibili

Joining us today from Bilibili senior management are Mr. Rui Chen, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, Ms. Ni Li, Vice Chairwoman of the Board and Chief Operating Officer, and Mr. Sam Fan, Chief Financial Officer. I will now turn the call to Mr. Chen.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Thank you, Juliet, and thank you to everyone joining us today. 2026 is off to a great start for Bilibili. In the first quarter, we kept up the momentum from last year, delivering solid growth across our community, commercialization, and profitability. Let's start with the community. High-quality content and authentic experience continue to drive organic growth and deepen user engagement. In Q1, DAUs grew 8% year-over-year to 115 million, and MAUs increased to 376 million. Average daily time spent reached a new high of 119 minutes, up 11 minutes year-over-year, which led to a 19% surge in total user time spent. We see this level of engagement as a powerful engine for our commercial business.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

In the first quarter, we delivered robust advertising revenue growth of 30% year-over-year, further accelerating from 2025. Meanwhile, MPUs increased by 7% year-over-year to 34.4 million as more users directly pay for content and services they truly care about on our platform. This commercial momentum led to a strong financial performance. Total revenues grew 7% year-over-year to RMB 7.5 billion. Gross profit was up 9% year-over-year, and gross margin reached 37.1%, marking our fifteenth consecutive quarter of margin expansion. Thanks to our top-line growth and increased operating leverage, our operating profit was over 10 times what it was a year ago. On a non-GAAP basis, net profit grew by 62% year-over-year, with our adjusted net profit margin expanding to 7.8%.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

To us, this set of results confirms a fundamental shift in user behavior. In a world full of quick hits, more users are choosing to spend more time on quality content. That is exactly what Bilibili stands for, and it will continue to drive our growth. With our average user now around 26.5 years old, our cohort is starting to spend more and spend better. As their needs evolve, we are staying close to them, offering the products and experiences they care about most. The content ecosystem we have built remains our most durable asset. Today, we are using AI to make this ecosystem even more powerful. We are focusing our investments on three key areas: how we understand videos, how we recommend them, and how we help creators build them.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Ultimately, we are not just evolving with AI, we are using it to reinforce the very thing that makes Bilibili unique. Having said that, we remain very disciplined with our capital. Although AI requires an upfront investment, the returns in engagement and monetization are already tangible. At the same time, AI is driving meaningful efficiencies across our operations, which is directly supporting our margin expansion. By combining the heart of our community with the power of our technology, we are creating lasting value for our users and shareholders. With that, let me walk you through our core pillars of content, community, and commercialization, starting with content and community. As content options multiply, users are becoming even more selective. They are coming to Bilibili for high-quality PUGV content and a unique community experience that they cannot find anywhere else. Across our content categories, ACG remains our cultural anchor.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

In the first quarter, watch time for games and Chinese anime grew 27% and 20% year-over-year, respectively, proving our enduring appeal to the younger generation. Beyond our ACG legacy, knowledge-based content, including AI-related information, grew 20% year-over-year as users turn to us for deeper insights. Music categories also saw robust growth with a 25% year-over-year increase in time spent, largely driven by AIGC music. Consumption-related categories kept rising, with watch time for parenting and early education and outdoor-related categories surging by more than 50% year-over-year. The breadth of our content library is only one part of the story. Our deeper competitive moat lies in the humanity of the community. Every month, our users generate over 17 billion real human interactions.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

In an AI-driven world, they are the most authentic human signals available. While high-quality data is becoming a global scarcity, our hundreds of billions of organic interactions provide us with the gold standard for understanding true human preferences. This profound insight is what fuels our engagement and loyalty. In the first quarter, total user time spent rose 19% year-over-year, and 291 million official members maintained an 80% twelve-month retention rate. Meanwhile, we continue to see AI as an amplifier for our ecosystem's flywheel. On the supply side, the unique creative spirit of our community has found new momentum through the AI-powered tools that scale creativity across the platform. By lowering the barriers to entry and boosting productivity, we have seen a significant influx of creators and content.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

In Q1, the number of daily active creators and daily submissions grew by 6% and 19% year-over-year respectively. This isn't just a game of volume. With AI assisting the creative process, more talent is producing high-quality breakout content right out of the gate. Our recent AI creation contest is a perfect example. We attracted the most talented creators to join our platform, creating nearly 150 breakout works with over a million views each. By deepening our comprehension of both content and user behavior, we've made content discovery more efficient, directly accelerating growth for our creators. In the first quarter, the number of creators with over 1,000 followers grew by more than 30% year-over-year, and those with 10,000, 100,000, and one million or more followers each grew over 20%. Naturally, as their audiences grow, earnings follow.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Average income per creator rose 24% this quarter, creating a powerful virtuous cycle. Now let us take a closer look at our commercial businesses and their progress. First, our advertising business once again delivered standout results in Q1. Revenues grew 30% year-over-year, reaching RMB 2.6 billion. This ongoing acceleration reflects the value of our community that we continue to unlock and how we are turning user engagement into real results for advertisers. In Q1, our top five ad verticals were games, internet services, digital products and home appliances, e-commerce, and automotive. Game ads delivered strong incremental revenue growth this quarter. In the internet services sector, AI advertisers kept scaling, with ad budgets surging over 170% year-over-year. At the same time, our maturing user base is also capturing more advertisers' budgets.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Ad revenues from digital products and home appliances and automotive both grew over 30% year-over-year in Q1. Home decoration was a particular standout, with ad spending jumping more than 130% year-over-year. Using AI to improve efficiency and drive ad business is a core priority this year. By integrating AI more deeply into our algorithms, we've gained much sharper insights into user interests and long-term patterns. This clarity has meaningfully optimized how we match users with ads, resulting in a 25% year-over-year increase in CTCVR of performance-based ads this quarter. Furthermore, our AIGC tools are streamlining creative production and crafting ads that resonate with users, helping advertisers connect with our community more effectively and drive higher click-through rates. We are also unlocking growth across diverse platforms and touchpoints.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

In the first quarter, ad revenues from PC and OTT platforms grew by over 50% year-over-year, while new scenarios like search and mini-programs more than doubled. We're exploring new integrated formats within Video Player, finding new ways to turn user time into commercial value. With expanding traffic, diverse new scenarios, and continuous efficiency gains, we remain confident in the sustained momentum of our ad business. Now turning to our games business. Game revenues were RMB 1.5 billion, down 12% year-over-year and flat quarter-over-quarter. The year-over-year decline was mainly due to the high base set by San Guo: Mou Ding Tian Xia in the same period last year. While the latest seasons of San Mou performed steadily quarter-over-quarter, we're focused on the game's long-term life cycle, keeping the experience balanced and the IP strong.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Meanwhile, our evergreen titles, FGO and Azur Lane, remain stable and continue to provide a solid revenue base. In 2026, we're building on Sanmo's success and expanding our presence in the Three Kingdoms IP. In April, we soft-launched N Card: San Guo Dai Xiang Pai, a lighter casual card game that has received positive feedback on its core gameplay. We're iterating the product and optimizing user acquisition as we prepare for its official launch this July. Meanwhile, our new SLG title, Sanwang: San Guozhi Wang Dao Tianxia, began initial testing in late March. Built on the original San Guozhi IP with enhanced 3D visuals, Sanwang targets a differentiated group of SLG fans and complements Sanmo. Early user feedback was encouraging, and we plan to roll the game out late this year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Beyond N Card and Sanwang, our self-developed simulation game, Lumi Master: Xiaoyao Wa Lumi, entered its paid testing in May. We plan to bring it to global gamers in Q4 this year. It has been well-received for its cozy art style and accessible gameplay. Our jointly operated pipeline for the coming quarters is also expanding into more genres, giving us broader player coverage and a more balanced portfolio. Turning to our VAS business, VAS revenue grew by 4% year-over-year to RMB 2.9 billion in Q1. We kept refining our live broadcasting operations, delivering a stable performance with improved gross margin. premium members reached 24.8 million by the end of the first quarter, up 5% year-over-year. Around 80% are on annual or auto-renewal plans. Our Charging Plan also kept growing at a healthy pace.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

Revenue was up over 50% year-over-year, driven by stronger creator-user relationships and users growing willingness to directly support content they love. In April, we published our 2025 ESG report outlining our continued focus on high-quality content, healthy community development, and steady improvements in governance and operations. Given our reach and influence among China's young generation, we take this responsibility very seriously, and we have maintained our A rating by MSCI, reflecting our consistent approach to long-term sustainable growth. To close, we believe great content and a strong community bring people together. The value we have built is just beginning to show its potential. With AI as the accelerator, our community and commercial ecosystems are reinforcing each other more than ever. We will stay focused on strengthening that flywheel and investing in areas that support long-term growth, taking Bilibili to the next level.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

We are excited about what is ahead. With that, I will turn the call over to Sam to walk through our financials in more detail. Sam?

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

Thank you, Rui Chen. Hello, everyone. This is Sam. In the interest of time on today's call, I will review our first quarter highlights. We encourage you to refer to our press release issued earlier today for a closer look at our results. Total revenues for the first quarter was RMB 7.5 billion, up 7% year-over-year. Our total revenues breakdown by revenue stream for Q1 was approximately 39% VAS, 35% advertising, 20% mobile games, and 6% from our IP derivatives and other businesses. Our cost of revenues increased by 5% year-over-year to RMB 4.7 billion in the first quarter. While our gross profit rose 9% year-over-year to RMB 2.8 billion.

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

Our gross profit margin reached 37.1% in Q1, up from 36.3% in the same period last year, marking our 15th consecutive quarter of margin expansion. In the first quarter, we continued to improve monetization efficiency with disciplined spending. Our total operating expenses were up 3% year-over-year to RMB 2.6 billion. Sales and marketing expenses decreased by 1% year-over-year. G&A expenses increased by 3%, and R&D expenses increased by 9%, primarily due to expanded AI investments and partially offset by efficient spending control. Our operating profit was RMB 167 million, up over 10 times year-over-year.

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

Our adjusted operating profit reached RMB 524 million, and our adjusted operating profit margin reached 7.0% in the first quarter versus 4.9% in the same period a year ago. Net profit was RMB 202 million versus an RMB 11 million net loss in Q1 2025. Our adjusted net profit was RMB 585 million, up 62% year-over-year, and our adjusted net profit margin was 7.8%, improved from 5.2% in the same period a year ago. As of March 31, 2026, we had cash and cash equivalents, time deposits, and short-term investments of RMB 24.2 billion or $3.5 billion.

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

In Q1, we repurchased 2.5 million shares for a total cost of $60.3 million under our $200 million share repurchase program. As of today, we have completed this share repurchase program, purchasing a total of 9.9 million shares. We remain committed to enhancing long-term shareholder return, and our board is considering renewing the share repurchase program at an appropriate time. Thank you for your attention. We would now like to open the call to your questions. Operator, please go ahead.

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question now, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. For the benefit of all participants on today's call, if you wish to ask your question to management in Chinese, please immediately repeat your question in English. The company will provide consecutive interpretation for management statements during the Q&A session. Please note that English interpretation is for convenience purposes only. In the case of any discrepancy, management statements in the original language will prevail. A moment for our first question. We will now take our first question from the line of Lincoln Kong of Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead, Lincoln. Your line is open.

Lincoln Kong
Lincoln Kong
Analyst at Goldman Sachs

Hey. Thank you much for taking my question. Congrats on a very solid first quarter result. My question is about the community. We have seen our user metrics have continued to deliver a stellar performance. How significant is this AI has been a driver in terms of the user acquisition and engagement duration? Also, what's our perspective on the strategic role that sort of this AI created assisted creation tools has played with with the Bilibili's content ecosystem. Thank you.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

What's really driving our user growth and time spend is still Bilibili's rich supply of high quality content and our very unique community experience.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

AI doesn't change that fundamental logic. If anything, it's making our strength even stronger.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

From a high quality content supply perspective, as I mentioned last quarter, AI is bringing greater leverage.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, please remain on the line. Your conference will resume shortly.

Translator

Pushing their expression boundaries and unleash so much more productivity.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

That's why you're seeing in during the first quarter that the average daily active content creator and their daily submission grew by 6% and 19% year-over-year respectively.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

it's not just about efficiency. AI is not only helping us to increase supply, but we are seeing it bringing so much quality into our content offering.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

For example, in some category, AI is already fundamentally changing how content gets made. For example, in the film industry, it requires a full crew to work on the shooting and production and post-production area. Now with the help of AI, we only need one or two very core production and creativity people, and they can make the equivalent or even better content.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

is that another example would be music. In the traditional music industry, it requires a full crew and team to work on music productions. Now with the help of AI, just one talented content creator can make very high quality, music content.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

That's why we're very delighted to see that in the past, some categories that was very hard and expensive to make. Now with the help of AI, the most talented content creator can make this production very easily.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

In our most recent AI creation contest, we're seeing that AIGC videos are very, very impressive in terms of the quality that, over this contest, we saw over 150 videos each surpassed one million views. In summary, we are seeing that AI is bringing so much more quality and quantity into the PV-PUGV field.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Another booster is that AI amplifies the power of Bilibili community. In a community like Bilibili, where user love content, know what they want, have high standards, have strong taste, high quality content is naturally more likely to stand out.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Every We're seeing AI is making that effect even more stronger. Every month, our user generates more than 17 billion real human interactions on Bilibili. In the AI era, this kind of human, real human feedback and tagging is becoming even more valuable. Like I said, those tagging, those feedbacks are from people who know what they want, who have strong taste, and have high desire for high quality content.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

our internally developed model, we are spending a lot of time to making it understand what is high quality content and identify those high quality content in a much earlier stage.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We are seeing this ability to directly translate on creators followers growth. In the first quarter, the number of content creator with more than 1,000 followers grew by over 30% year-over-year. Creators that with 10,000, 100,000 and 1,000,000 followers also grew by more than 20% year-over-year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

As creator get more followers, they also make more money. In Q1, average income per creator is up, 24% year-over-year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

To summarize, AI is making our great content creator even more powerful, and Bilibili is the home to many of the most creative creators, the one who really wanted to express themselves and build lasting connection with users.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Over the years, we've built a very strong creator ecosystem and community culture, and AI is really amplifying that effect. We believe this historical opportunity of AI can bring the opportunity that makes Bilibili 10 times more valuable, and we will really invest and seize that opportunity for us. Thank you. Operator, next question please.

Operator

Thank you. We will now take our next question from Daniel Chen of JPMorgan. Please ask your question. Daniel, your line is open.

Daniel Chen
Daniel Chen
Analyst at JPMorgan

[Non-English content]My question is on the advertising revenue.

Daniel Chen
Daniel Chen
Analyst at JPMorgan

We see that the ad revenue growth accelerated to 30% year-over-year in the first quarter, which is very strong. May we know which industry for the ads product actually exceed your expectation? Also, how should we expect the outlook for the second quarter and the full year advertising revenue? Thank you.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Our advertising revenue reported RMB 2.6 billion in the first quarter, up 30% year-over-year, marking our thirteenth consecutive quarter of a double-digit growth.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

At the very core, the biggest driver behind our advertising growth is still the value of Bilibili's community and our users.

Translator

The average age of our user is about 26.5 years old, which means they are entering a stage of life where both personal spending power and household decision-making power are rising rapidly.

Translator

That is exactly the kind of high-value user group advertisers are most eager to reach.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

What sets us apart from platforms that are purely traffic-driven is that the value of advertising on Bilibili is never one-off spending.

Translator

Instead, we run much deeper into users' mindshare.

Translator

We help our brands to move from a single one-off impression to repeated continuous touchpoints, and from a single isolated transaction to build lasting brand equity

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

That is exactly why we saw a continuous growth of our advertising efficiency.

Translator

During Q1, our brand ads, performance ads, and native ads all delivered a strong double-digit growth, and for certain categories, even high double-digit growth.

Translator

For Q1, our top five advertising verticals were games, internet services, digital products and home appliances, e-commerce, and automotive.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Looking ahead into Q2 and onwards, we do see a deeper integration of AI into our advertising system will continue to improve our ad efficiency in the near term.

Translator

More importantly, we believe the bigger value will come from the long-term transformation that AI can bring to ads business

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

This year, we've continued to improve both distribution efficiency and recommendation algorithms.

Translator

We have further leveled up our ability to understand user interest, purchase intent, and our content themselves. By plugging this into our recommendation models, we can now match user content and ads so much more precisely. That's the reason why you see the strong growth in our advertising revenue in Q1.

Translator

This is driving a more accurate matching capability delivered and a strong CTCVR growth for our performance ads in the first quarter.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We are also providing advertisers with more automated campaign management and AI powered creative tools to help them to improve ads delivery efficiency. In Q1, penetration of our automated ad spending increased to about 85%, and we will continue to see this penetration to further increase into Q1 and for the rest of the year.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

On top of that, the AIGC tools are helping advertisers to create the materials that perfectly buy with Bilibili community style, and the adoption of AIGC creative continue to increase. At the same time, these AIGC creatives are delivering much better ad performances with improved click through rates, generally around double digits better.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

That summarize, how AI is helping us to improve our ad efficiency. I will be sharing more information on next quarter and going forward. We believe, there are so much more that AI can bring into our a-ad system. On top of that, we're also expanding ad inventory across different screens and more user scenarios from the mobile app to our PC, iPad, OTT and in-car screens. We currently already cover a majority of that scenarios. On different, products or ad scenarios, we are also trying new inventories from feed to search, comments, and in-player ads and mini programs. This is covering Bilibili users time spent across the major, product touchpoints. This will bring in additional ad inventory and ad volume for our business.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Well, on top of that ad inventory and scenario growth, our strategy across different ad industry is also very important and we will continue to deepen our services into different, industry verticals. By aligning ourselves operation tech capabilities, we can now offer a full stack solution tailored to each specific industry. Looking into the second half of this year, we expect stronger growth momentum from those high-value categories such as AI technology, automotive, home decoration, and appliances, which we believe will continue to lead a very strong growth. Meanwhile, we will also continue to expand our market share in our core verticals such as games, e-commerce, and education.

Ni Li
Ni Li
Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

To summarize, we remain confident in maintaining a very healthy advertising growth for the rest of the year. Thank you. Operator, next question, please.

Operator

Thank you. We will now take our next question from Yang Liu of Morgan Stanley. Please ask your question. Yang, your line is open.

Yang Liu
Yang Liu
Analyst at Morgan Stanley

[Non-English content] Yeah, let me translate my question.

Yang Liu
Yang Liu
Analyst at Morgan Stanley

My question is about the game segment. Could management comment on the Three Kingdoms N card soft launch performance? What is now expectation for this game? Also another self-developed game Lumi Master started the paid test this month. What's the test result and what is the expectation on launch timing? Another game Three Kingdoms [Non-English content] how to expect this game's contribution? Could management comment if there's any other game pipeline except for the three game I mentioned before. Thank you.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

The N card soft launch performance is, generally in line with expectation. We plan to official launch this game in July this year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

This game is one of a kind game and the first of its kind that features a very unique gameplay system that blends hero skills with poker mechanism. From the soft launch feedback, our user, we find this gameplay has resonate with young user groups quite nicely.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Because this game is very creative and innovative, we take the approach to iterate the game as we launch, as we collect more user feedbacks. We believe this is a more sustainable approach to make this game even better.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We believe this game has the potential to become a large DAU title that can last for a very long time in this casual category, and we believe it has the right elements to get to that. We are putting a lot of resource and hoping this game will continue to refine its game plan operation. By the time it's ready, we will be launching it to a mass audience.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Well, as we mentioned the N card Three Kingdoms, I will briefly touch upon the San Wang title. The San Wang title is a very unique SLG title based on the very authentic Three Kingdom IP by Koei. This game has stayed true to the original Three Kingdom IP and experience while introducing so much refreshed 3D visual style. It's targeting a more mature SLG audiences and has higher taste towards the game's quality and visual experience.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We think Sanwang and San Mo really complement each other, but with a differentiated target user group. Where Sanwang is targeted to the IP fans who has strong taste and preferences towards a better visual quality. Where San Mo targets a younger cohort that doesn't want to spend so much time and money into the SLG title. That is the reason why after launching San Mo, we choose to license another title in the Three Kingdoms IP. We think these two titles have great synergies and really complement each other.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We already completed the first round of beta test pay testing at the end of March for San Wang title, and we saw very positive user feedback. We are currently continuing refine and polishing the title and listening closely to user feedback, and we are planning to launch this title within this year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Next, I'll talk about our self-developed game, Lumi Master. For Lumi Master, it is also one of its kind, the very first title that combines pet hatching with casual gameplay.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

We started a global user testing in early May this year and that we have received a very encouraging user feedback and we are targeting a global launch for this title in Q4 this year.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Lastly, I wanted to briefly touch upon Escape from Duckov, which is a Bilibili self-development title. This year, we broke another record, by selling over four million copies of this game.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

As we continue to promote this game on the PC front, we are actively working on the console version and the mobile version. Our goal is to continue to enhance the IP and over time make this IP Escape from Duckov IP become a well known franchise, for young gamers.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

Over the past few years, I've been sharing our game strategy. I think it summarized to three points. One is, long term operation. We've seen that into our legacy title, FGO and Azur Lane, which are celebrating its tenth year anniversary and ninth year anniversary respectively this year. San Mo is going to celebrate its second year anniversary very soon. Going forward for all Bilibili game title, we are targeting a very long term operation, even for console one off games like Escape from Duckov. We're hoping this game will have lasting impact when we continue to generate sales over time. Long term operation is definitely one of the most important strategy for our game business.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

The second strategy is to become the leader in the segment genre. First of all, our strategy into game genre is very, very focused. We will be deciding a good direction how we will dig deep into this genre to become either the best or the first in this genre. For example, the SLG, the Three Kingdom IP, we've launched one game, we have two in the pipeline, and we have more that's coming up. Potentially in the near future, we will build a Three Kingdom universe. Another example is the console game, the PC copy based game. This is also a direction we believe has very large opportunity and strong user demand, and we will be focusing to produce the best or become the first in its own kind. This will be another important strategy for our game business.

Rui Chen
Rui Chen
Chairman of the Board and CEO at Bilibili

[Non-English content]

Translator

The last one is we creating games for young generation of gamers. We believe that for all game business, that focusing on young user is a must. As a young generation community hub, we're the platform that is closest to this young cohort and understanding their desire, inventing games to cater to their preferences is that, is Bilibili bread and butter. By staying close to the young generation, there will always be good opportunities. This is showing on our N card and our Lumi Master titles. Fundamentally, we are just creating a new title. We are creating or reinventing this title to catering to this generation of gamers that fits their tastes the best. By staying close to the young gamers, we believe this brings us so much more opportunity. That concludes this question and this question. The operator, next question, please.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Xueqing Zhang of CICC. Please ask your question Xueqing. Your line is open.

Xueqing Zhang
Xueqing Zhang
Analyst at CICC

[Non-English content] Thanks management for taking my question. My question is about financials. Last quarter, the company mentioned that it would increase investments in AI. What is the progress so far? When should we expect to see meaningful returns from these AI investments?

Xueqing Zhang
Xueqing Zhang
Analyst at CICC

Also could you provide some color on the outlook for OpEx and the CapEx related to AI as well as the margin outlook for the second quarter and the full year? Thank you.

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

Thanks, Xueqing. This is Sam, I will take this question. About the direction of our AI investment, as mentioned by Rui Chen, we are very focused primarily on keyword of Bilibili video. We are investing three main areas: video understanding, video distribution and video creation. We believe this investment will significantly enhance the value of Bilibili's content ecosystem and the community, and it directly benefit all monetization lines. In Q1, we have already began exploring and applying these efforts. Recent initiative results evidenced in our DAU growth, user time spent growth and advertising revenue growth. We expect the positive feedback loop has just begun and will continue to deliver greater efficiency. Regarding to the CapEx, in Q1, our CapEx increased about 80% year-over-year, around RMB 200 million, mainly driven by higher investment in servers and computing resources to support AI improvements.

Sam Fan
Sam Fan
CFO at Bilibili

For the full year, we expect our AI related CapEx to increase by approximately RMB 1 billion, with an impact on P&L of around RMB 500 million. Meanwhile, we will cut certain OPEX expenses to offset part of such impact. Using our Q1 result as an example, when we see our expenses increased by 9% year-over-year, while we still deliver solid bottom line results. Driven by revenue growth and continued operating leverage, our adjusted net profit increased by 62% year-over-year, with adjusted net profit margin rising to 7.8%. We expect Q2 advertising revenue to maintain rapid growth with the contribution from our AI initiatives, with gross margin steadily improving and the net profit margin have further room to increase. We also maintain our mid to long term gross margin target 40%-45% and operating profit ratio target of 15%-20% unchanged. Thank you for this question.

Operator

Thank you. That concludes the question and answer session. Thank you once again for joining Bilibili's first quarter 2026 financial results and business updates conference call today. If you have any further questions, please contact Juliet Yang, Bilibili's executive IR director or Piacente Financial Communications. Contact information for IR in both China and the U.S. can be found on today's press release. Thank you and have a great day.

Executives
    • Juliet Yang
      Juliet Yang
      Executive Director of Investor Relations
    • Ni Li
      Ni Li
      Vice Chairwoman of the Board and COO
    • Rui Chen
      Rui Chen
      Chairman of the Board and CEO
    • Sam Fan
      Sam Fan
      CFO
Analysts
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