With a market capitalization of 3.12 trillion U.S. dollars as of May 2024, Microsoft was the world’s largest company that year. Rounding out the top five were some of the world’s most recognizable brands: Apple, NVIDIA, Google’s parent company Alphabet, and Amazon. Saudi Aramco led the ranking of the world's most profitable companies in 2023, with a pre-tax income of nearly 250 billion U.S. dollars. How are market value and market capitalization determined? Market value and market capitalization are two terms frequently used – and confused - when discussing the profitability and viability of companies. Strictly speaking, market capitalization (or market cap) is the worth of a company based on the total value of all their shares; an important metric when determining the comparative value of companies for trading opportunities. Accordingly, many stock exchanges such as the New York or London Stock Exchange release market capitalization data on their listed companies. On the other hand, market value technically refers to what a company is worth in a much broader context. It is determined by multiple factors, including profitability, corporate debt, and the market environment as a whole. In this sense it aims to estimate the overall value of a company, with share price only being one element. Market value is therefore useful for determining whether a company’s shares are over- or undervalued, and in arriving at a price if the company is to be sold. Such valuations are generally made on a case-by-case basis though, and not regularly reported. For this reason, market capitalization is often reported as market value. What are the top companies in the world? The answer to this question depends on the metric used. Although the largest company by market capitalization, Microsoft's global revenue did not manage to crack the top 20 companies. Rather, American multinational retailer Walmart was ranked as the largest company in the world by revenue. Walmart also had the highest number of employees in the world.

As of May 2025, Amazon was the biggest internet company worldwide with a market cap of over ************ U.S. dollars Second-ranked Alphabet had a market capitalization of **** trillion U.S. dollars. The end of the 1990s in the United States saw the rise of a great number of internet companies, also called online companies or a variety of the name “dot com,” where the “.com” domain is derived from the word commercial. At the time, such startups were merely riding the wave of early internet business, but had little capital and perhaps one good idea. Few companies have survived the burst of the dot com bubble and even fewer have managed to become internationally successful. A few notable exceptions are American companies such as Google (founded in 1998), Amazon (founded in 1994) or eBay Inc. (founded in 1995), and the Chinese online giant Alibaba (founded in 1998), which have come to be some of the largest internet companies in the world. One of the largest internet companies worldwide is currently Alphabet, the parent company of Google, with a market capitalization of **** trillion U.S. dollars as of May 2025. Having started as a PhD project at Stanford University, the Google project slowly gained traction and is now the number one search engine in the world, with a market share of ** percent on the search engine market. Due to a number of high profile acquisitions, Google has expanded its portfolio beyond search, to include the video content sharing site YouTube, the digital app platform Google Play Store, the webmail service Gmail and the web browser Google Chrome, to only name a few. In October 2015, Google reorganized itself into a newly created parent company, the multinational conglomerate Alphabet Inc. The biggest internet companies in terms of their workforce are currently Amazon, Alphabet and Meta.

The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) is the largest stock exchange in the world, with an equity market capitalization of almost ** trillion U.S. dollars as of June 2025. The following three exchanges were the NASDAQ, PINK Exchange, and the Frankfurt Exchange. What is a stock exchange? A stock exchange is a marketplace where stockbrokers, traders, buyers, and sellers can trade in equities products. The largest exchanges have thousands of listed companies. These companies sell shares of their business, giving the general public the opportunity to invest in them. The oldest stock exchange worldwide is the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, founded in the late sixteenth century. Other functions of a stock exchange Since these are publicly traded companies, every firm listed on a stock exchange has had an initial public offering (IPO). The largest IPOs can raise billions of dollars in equity for the firm involved. Related to stock exchanges are derivatives exchanges, where stock options, futures contracts, and other derivatives can be traded.

In 1989, the Industrial Bank of Japan had a market capitalization of approximately 104.29 billion U.S dollars, making it the largest company in the world at the time. Six of the ten largest companies worldwide in 1989 were based in Japan while the remaining four were American, highlighting the economic dominance of these two countries in the late 1980s.

With the growth of the Chinese economy, an increasing number of Chinese companies are appearing on the Forbes Global 2000 list. **************** was the Chinese company with the largest market value. Its market value amounted to around ****** billion U.S. dollars in 2023. Chinese companies on Forbes Global 2000 China had the second highest number of companies on this list, trailing behind the United States. Among the first ten public companies on the Global 2000 ranking, three were companies headquartered in China. The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) ranked as first Chinese enterprise on Forbes Global 2000 ranking. The leading four Chinese companies on the 2024 ranking are all from the financial sector. The rise of China's tech-giants Besides companies from the financial sector and energy sector, China's biggest internet companies Tencent and Alibaba also had good rankings. Both companies have grown significantly over the past years due to the rapid development of the internet business sector and the huge market in China. However, they have fallen back in the global ranking recently due to Beijing's tightened control of the tech sector. Both companies are investing a lot in the application of artificial intelligence to improve their working efficiency and clients’ experience.

This statistic presents a ranking of the market capitalization of selected U.S. tech and internet companies in 2006, and from 2014 to 2020. Apple's market cap soared from 461.41 billion U.S. dollars in 2014 to 1.53 trillion dollars in 2020. Apple's market cap pushed the company ahead of last year's leader Microsoft.

Public offerings of tech and internet companies

A public offering is the offering of securities of a company or a similar corporation to the public. Generally, the securities are to be listed on a stock exchange. The initial public offering (IPO) of a company occurs when a company offers its shares for the first time for public ownership and trading.

Hardware companies such as Apple or IBM have been traded publicly for a while but younger, online-based companies such as Google or most notably Facebook and most recently, Snap Inc. have been generating a lot of buzz surrounding their IPOs and subsequent stock prices. Facebook’s initial public offering was intensely hyped over months with projections of a 100 billion US dollar valuation but it dwindled down to a range of 60 to 75 billion US dollars prior to the listing.

Other tech stock performances have been more stable – both online retailer Amazon and search and digital advertising giant Google’s - now Alphabet's - shares have been on a more upwards trend. The most impressive development however came from Apple which totally changed its stock performance after the 2008 introduction of the iPhone. Since then, the company has been catapulted to the top of the smartphone market, multiplying its market capitalization as well as regularly being ranked as one of the most valuable brands worldwide.

Amazon is the biggest consumer internet and online service company worldwide with a market cap of approximately 1.34 trillion U.S. dollars as of June 2023. Amazon was ranked first among selected online companies operating in the retail, real estate, mobility, travel and hospitality sectors. The digital commerce platform Alibaba.com ranked second with a market cap of 214 billion U.S. dollars.

As of May 23, 2025, Microsoft was the leading tech company by market capitalization globally at 3.38 trillion U.S. dollars. Nvidia ranked second at 3.24 trillion U.S. dollars. Tech company stocks were impacted through 2025 as a result of various global tariff threats by the United States government. Apple among the leaders Since its foundation in a Californian garage in 1976, Apple has expanded massively, becoming one of the most valuable companies in the world. The company started its origins in the PC industry with the Macintosh, but soon entered other segments of the consumer electronics market. Today, the iPhone is the most popular Apple product, although Mac, iPad, wearables, and services also contribute to its high revenues. Aiming at innovation, Apple invests every year in research and development, spanning a wide array of technologies from AI through to extended reality. Nvidia's immense growth With a focus that began with origins in gaming, Nvidia's business strategy has been transformed by demand from data centers that sit at the heart of the AI boom. The company's chips have been favored to support in the training and running of a range of large language models, most notably in the development of OpenAI's ChatGPT.

As of January 2025, Amazon's market capitalization surpassed 2.4 trillion U.S. dollars, making it the most valuable internet company by market capitalization worldwide. Second-ranked Alphabet had a market capitalization of approximately 2.2 trillion U.S. dollars. Social networking company Meta Platforms (née Facebook Inc.) ranked third. Facebook is the leading social network worldwide and has successfully taken advantage of the increasingly mobile online environment. Amazon's position in the market Amazon is one of the biggest internet companies worldwide by revenue. It generates profit from its position as the world's largest online retailer. In 2023, the company's net sales revenue amounted to 574.78 billion U.S. dollars. The e-commerce giant's net revenue, generated through online stores, was 231.87 billion U.S. dollars. Google and its most profitable services Google, with the parent company Alphabet inc, generates its revenue mainly from advertising. The company uses its advertisement services, such as Google AdWords – which takes advantage of Google searches and appears as small advertisements next to search results – and Google AdSense, which generates advertisements based on a user's search history and location, among others. Advertisements based on AdSense appear across Google-owned sites, including YouTube and Google Finance. The online company also profits from the development of Android OS, licensing, and mobile apps. In 2024, Google’s total revenue amounted to 348.16 billion U.S. dollars.

The NYSE U.S. 100 Index tracks the largest U.S. companies traded on the New York Stock Exchange. This statistic shows the leading 20 companies on the NYSE U.S. 100 Index by market capitalization. As of January 28, 2024 the multinational conglomerate company ****************** ranked as the first, with a market capitalization of over *** billion euros. This was followed by ********* and ***************, with market capitalizations amounting to *** billion and *** billion euros respectively. NYSE U.S. 100 Index vs. Nasdaq 100 Index The New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq are the largest two stock exchanges in the world, but they differ in the kinds of companies they list. The NYSE is known to list stable and long-lasting firms, commonly referred to as “blue-chip” companies. In contrast, the Nasdaq is renowned for listing the world’s biggest companies, mainly from the tech industry. Similar to the NYSE U.S. 100 Index, the Nasdaq 100 Index tracks the 100 largest non-financial companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange, including both U.S. and non-U.S. companies. The leader of the NYSE U.S. 100 index: Berkshire Hathaway Berkshire Hathaway, the leader of the NYSE U.S. 100 Index, was also among the world's largest companies by revenue in 2023. The company is a multinational conglomerate and holding company with insurance as its core business and interests in other sectors such as railroad, utilities and energy, finance. In fact, Berkshire was the world's biggest insurance company by revenue in 2023. As a holding company, it has significant stakes in some of the world’s largest companies, including Apple, Bank of America and Coca-Cola. With its diverse background in various businesses and industries, Berkshire Hathaway had a total revenue of *** billion U.S. dollars in 2023.

As of July 2024, the market capitalization of ******************** amounted to *** billion Canadian dollars, which placed the company at the top of the ranking. What is market capitalization? Market capitalization is one of the measures of the financial strength of a company. It shows the value of shares outstanding of a publicly traded company. It is basically calculated by multiplying the number of shares traded on a stock exchange by the price of a single share. Worldwide rankings In the United States, *************** had the largest market cap among the U.S. banks, amounting to ****** billion U.S. dollars as of January 2025. The bank was also the leader in the global ranking, followed by ***************, and **********************************************.

As of January 2025, the largest company by market capitalization listed on the Euronext stock exchange was the French luxury goods company ****, which consists of ********************************. At this time, the company's market capital value was around *** billion euros and in second place was another French company, ********************, with *** billion euros. Euronext overview Headquartered in Paris and Amsterdam, the exchange operator Euronext stands out as one of the rest of the worldwide exchanges, Euronext has only been in operation for 25 years and was initially created through the merger of the Amsterdam, Brussels, and Paris stock exchanges. Nevertheless, it has swiftly gained global recognition. Market performance monthly market capitalization values across European stock exchanges from 2019 to 2024, reflecting sustained growth over this period.

As of March 2025, **************************, a multinational beverage and retail company headquartered in Monterey, was the largest public company in Latin America, with a market capitalization of nearly *** billion U.S. dollars. ************ follows with a market cap of about ** billion U.S. dollars, while ********, a Brazilian energy company, takes the third spot with a market cap of ** billion U.S. dollars.

The Nasdaq 100 Index tracks the largest domestic and international non-financial companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange. This statistic shows the leading 20 companies on the Nasdaq 100 Index by market capitalization. As of January 2025, the American technology company ***** ranked first, with a market capitalization of over ***** trillion euros. This was followed by ******, with a market capitalization amounting to *** trillion euros.

According to Forbes Global 2000 ranking released on June 12, 2025, Taiwan Semiconductor was the biggest public company in Taiwan, with a market value of around 708 billion U.S. dollars, up from 672 billion U.S. dollars in the previous years' evaluation. As a global foundry leader, Taiwan Semiconductor generated around 97 billion U.S. dollars in sales revenue in 2024.

************ was the leading domestic company in Japan based on market capitalization, which amounted to around **** trillion Japanese yen in June 2025. ****************************** ranked second with a market capitalization of about **** trillion yen. With an aggregate market capitalization of over *** trillion yen in 2024, the Tokyo Stock Exchange is one of the largest stock exchanges in the world.

ExxonMobil has the highest market capitalization of any oil and gas producer worldwide. As of June 18, 2024, the United States-based company had a market cap of ****** billion U.S. dollars. Big Oil's place among the ten leading oil and gas companies Of the five largest companies in this ranking, three were considered Big Oil companies. Meanwhile, the Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries, which operates the world's largest oil refinery complex and is also involved in retail and telecommunications, ranked fourth, with a market cap of more than *** billion U.S. dollars. KPI's of top oil & gas companies While there has been little change in which companies are counted among the largest within their industry, their ranking varies depending on the metric used. Although ExxonMobil has often ranked first in terms of market capitalization, state-owned enterprises such as China's Sinopec are more likely to be found on top of a list of leading oil and gas companies worldwide based on revenue. State-owned enterprises such as Gazprom and PetroChina are furthermore the leading oil and gas companies worldwide based on employment. In 2023 and 2024, their respective workforce consisted of around ******* employees.

As of April 10, 2025, tech giants Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Alphabet (Google), and Amazon dominated the S&P 500 index and were among only eight companies with a market capitalization exceeding *** ******** U.S. dollars in the U.S.

In 2023, Walt Disney Company was the largest media company worldwide, with a market value of 183 billion U.S. dollars. In second place was Comcast Corporation with a market value of 170 billion U.S. dollars, followed by Charter Communications, Inc. at 53 billion U.S. dollars. Spotlight: Disney’s ever strong presence Not only is Disney a household name loved for its merchandise, theme parks, and near timeless appeal, it is also one of the most valuable media brands in the world. Despite the death of Walt Disney in 1966, the company went from strength to strength and kept up with the pace of every fast-moving market of which it is a part, with the most recent addition being streaming service Disney+. The Walt Disney Company has multiple assets, and its entertainment holdings include Marvel Studios, Lucasfilm, 20th Century Fox, Pixar, and ESPN Inc. These are indisputably Disney’s biggest money makers, as the media and entertainment segment accounts for 65 percent of the total. Spotlight: Comcast competing for customers Comcast, the owner of such entertainment brands as NBCUniversal, Sky, DreamWorks, and Universal Studios, generates the largest share of its revenue from its cable communications segment, at more than 53 percent. However, the growth of the video streaming market and the subsequent increase in cord-cutting in the United States is directly impacting the subscriptions of most companies and Comcast is no stranger to this trend. Since 2018, the company has seen losses in video subscribers intensify year-on-year. Comcast’s ad-supported streaming service, Xumo, competes with Roku, Pluto, and Plex for the number of channels offered to stay in the game and attract consumers.

As of June 2025, Nintendo held the top spot among the largest gaming companies by market cap. The multinational gaming company is headquartered in Kyoto, Japan, and develops as well as publishes both video games and gaming consoles. Nintendo’s market cap was nearly 107 billion U.S. dollars, ahead of second-ranked Roblox with 69.76 billion U.S. dollars. Roblox – a newcomer briefly shakes up the market (Formerly) indie gaming company Roblox Corporation started trading publicly on March 10, 2021, and closed its first day of trading activity with a market cap of over 37 billion U.S. dollars, ahead of several well-established industry heavyweights. After a significant decline throughout 2022 and 2023, Roblox Corporation was still ranked among the biggest gaming companies worldwide, with a market cap of 23.89 billion U.S. dollars in April 2024. Activision Blizzard – a giant exits the stage A summer of litigation caused Activision Blizzard's value to drop and the company to be relegated to second place with a market cap of nearly 46.98 billion U.S. dollars in October 2021 before bouncing back to 67.06 billion U.S. dollars in early 2023. Microsoft purchased the company in January 2022 in one of the biggest video game acquisitions of all time. After months of negotiations with regulatory bodies around the world, the deal was finalized in October 2023, and the company was taken off the market.