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 July 16, 2025, Nvidia was the leading tech company by market capitalization globally at 4.16 trillion U.S. dollars. Nvidia became the first company to ever achieve the four trillion milestone, hitting this figure for the first time in July 2025. Microsoft ranked second at 3.76 trillion U.S. dollars. 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. Apple is also 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.

In 2025, according to the source's ranking, Apple was the most valuable brand in the world. The technology giant had an estimated brand value of about 574.5 billion U.S. dollars, followed by Microsoft that was worth 461.1 billion dollars. The global dominance of technology companies   A closer look at the 2024 brand ranking reveals that U.S. tech brands once again dominated the top-10 list. As a case in point, the business technology and services platforms industry was the highest-valued sector worldwide among the 100 most valuable brands in 2023. Meanwhile, consumer technology and services platforms ranked second on the list. The importance of brand value Brand value, not to be mistaken with brand equity, is a term used in the marketing industry to describe the value of brands. The term is based on the implication that products with a well-known brand name can generate more money than those with a less well-known name. Strong brands enhance business performance primarily through their influence on three key stakeholder groups: customers, employees, and investors. They influence customer choice and create loyalty; attract, retain, and motivate talent; and lower the cost of financing for the companies.

Apple retained its position as the world’s most valuable brand in 2025, with an estimated brand value of nearly *** trillion U.S. dollars. Google ranked second, having been valued at *** billion dollars. Overall, the brand ranking was dominated by U.S.-based tech companies. Apple’s brand is synonymous with simplicity and innovation Apple is a California-based technology titan specializing in consumer electronics, software, and online services. According to the company’s latest filings, Apple’s global revenue reached *** billion U.S. dollars in 2024, with the iPhone being its most profitable operating segment. In addition to its signature smartphone, Apple’s other breakthrough products include the Mac computer, iPad tablet, and Apple Watch, all of which are continuously updated to match consumer needs and preferences. Nvidia Climbs into the Top 5 as AI Boom Accelerates A leading force in artificial intelligence, Nvidia reached the top five most valuable global brands for the first time in 2025. Behind the chips driving many of today’s generative AI applications, Nvidia is among the leading tech companies in terms of market capitalization, with a valuation of over ***** trillion U.S. dollars.

In 2009, Ecxxon Mobil Corp had a market capitalization of approximately ****** billion U.S dollars, making it the largest company in the world at the time. Five of the ten largest companies worldwide in 2009 were based in the United States, with three from Europe and two from China.

Dublin-based Accenture was by far the world’s most valuable IT services brand in 2025, with a brand value of 41.5 billion U.S. dollars. TCS and Infosys rounded out the top three brands.

In 2024, tech companies ranked as the most valuable brands in the world, covering the five top spots in the source’s ranking. Apple led the list with a brand value of nearly 489 billion U.S. dollars, followed by Microsoft, Amazon, and Google – each with brand values of over 290 billion dollars. Samsung closed the top five, at over 100 billion dollars in brand value. Big techs are also huge in terms of market value The source determined brand value by combining financial information, the role the brand plays in determining consumer choice (independent of other factors such as price and convenience), and a qualitative assessment of the brand’s overall strength. Considering only financial data, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet (Google’s parent company) and Microsoft would be still on the top, as they have some of the highest global market capitalizations. However, when considering only qualitative factors regarding brand strength, the list would look very different, with Chinese app WeChat being the strongest brand worldwide in 2024. Brand value vs. profitability Brand value does not always translate into profitability. While Apple also happens to be the second most profitable company in the world, other companies with strong brands such as Google and Amazon rank lower in terms of net income. This phenomenon does not only apply to tech companies – Coca-Cola did not feature on the list of the most profitable companies worldwide. This is likely due to their franchised distribution structure, whereby manufacturing operations are handled by separate companies, each of which operates independently with an exclusive license to manufacture Coca-Cola beverages in their territory.

In 1989, the Industrial Bank of Japan had a market capitalization of approximately ****** 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 *****.

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.

Google is a California-based, multinational internet company which provides digital products and services such as online search and advertising, cloud computing and software. As of 2020, Google was ranked as the third most valuable brand in the United States, with a brand value of around 303 billion U.S. dollars. Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Visa were the top five most valuable brands that year. Except for Visa, these companies also feature at the top of the rankings for most valuable global brands, showing the size of U.S. brands in the global market.

Brand value
Brand value, not to be mistaken with brand equity, is a commonly used phrase in the marketing industry. It describes the value of brands based on the assumption that the owner of a well-known brand name can generate more money compared to products with a less well-known name.

Nation brand value
When it comes to nation brand value, the United States was the leading country by some distance in 2019, valued at more than billion more than brand value of second placed China. Nation brand value refers to the impact of a country’s national image on a country’s economy and the brands based in the country.

In 2024, Vanke, a property development company based in Shenzhen, China, had a brand value of close to **** billion U.S. dollars and was the most valuable real estate brand globally. Eight of the top ten most valuable real estate companies worldwide were based in China. The Texas-headquartered real estate company CBRE, and Dubai-headquartered EMAAR, were the two non-Chinese companies that made the top 10 ranking.

With over *** billion U.S. dollars in revenue, Walmart topped the ranking of the hundred largest companies globally, followed by Amazon. Walmart was also the largest company in the world based on its number of employees, with some *** million all over the world. Largest corporations based on revenue - additional information The concept of revenue itself might slightly differ depending on country or even from one company to another. It usually refers to the income resulted from normal business activities, such as the sale of goods and services to customers. Walmart The American-based multinational corporation Walmart was founded in 1962 and currently operates over ****** stores worldwide, out of which ***** are in the United States alone. In 2024, Walmart was ranked the third most valuable retail brand in the world, with a brand value of about ** billion U.S. dollars. Follow this link to get access to the top 500 companies from all industries list.

As of early March 2025, Eli Lilly had a market cap of over *** billion U.S. dollars and thus was the leader among big pharma companies based on market capitalization. The massive rise of Eli Lilly's market value, which started in 2023, is based in a large part on its strong pipeline. This statistic depicts the top 10 biotech and pharmaceutical companies worldwide based on market capitalization as of 2025. Biotech and pharmaceutical companiesPharmaceutical companies are best known for manufacturing pharmaceutical drugs. These drugs have the aim to diagnose, to cure, to treat, or to prevent diseases. The pharmaceutical sector represents a huge industry, with the global pharmaceutical market being worth more than *** trillion U.S. dollars. Among the best known top global pharmaceutical players are Pfizer, Merck and Johnson & Johnson from the U.S., Novartis and Roche from Switzerland, Sanofi from France, etc. Most of these companies are involved not only in pure pharmaceutical business, but also manufacture medical technology and consumer health products, vaccines, etc. For example, Johnson & Johnson makes most of its revenues through medical devices, diagnostics and consumer health products. There are both pure play biotechnology companies and pharmaceutical companies which, among other products, also produce biotech products within their biotechnological divisions. Most of the leading global pharmaceutical companies have biopharmaceutical divisions. Although not a pure play biotech firm, Roche from Switzerland is among the leaders by revenues from biotech therapies worldwide. In contrast, California-based company Amgen is the world’s largest pure-play biotech company. Amgen made over ** billion U.S. dollars of revenue in 2024. Biotech companies use biotechnology to generate their products, most often medical drugs or agricultural genetic engineering. The latter segment was dominated by Monsanto, nowadays a part of Bayer CropScience. The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity defines biotechnology as follows: "Any technological application that uses biological systems, living organisms, or derivatives thereof, to make or modify products or processes for specific use." In fact, biotechnology is thousands of years old, used in agriculture, food manufacturing and medicine.

Astrazeneca was the leading pharmaceutical company in the United Kingdom as of March 7, 2024, with a market capitalization amounting to approximately ***** billion U.S. dollars. GlaxoSmithKline followed as the second largest pharma company in the country, with market capitalization of nearly **** billion U.S. dollars. Examining the development of the FTSE 100 Index, which was launched in January 1984 with a base level of 1,000, increased by more than sevenfold to date. What is the FTSE 100 index? The Financial Times Stock Exchange 100 Index, commonly known as the "Footsie", is the most widely recognized stock market index in the United Kingdom. It is made up of the 100 largest blue-chip companies on the London Stock Exchange. Companies from various sectors, such as healthcare, consumer goods, and energy, are included in the index, as are leading banks of the United Kingdom, such as HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, and Barclays. Moreover, it can be seen as a reflection of the investment climate in the United Kingdom. What is not included in the FTSE 100 Index? Most notably, the FTSE 100 Index, like most indices, is not adjusted for inflation. While inflation in the United Kingdom has gone down dramatically since 2023, it might be useful to adjust the historic figures on the index when comparing historic data to current levels. This is especially important when the index seems to have increased by a few percentage points because inflation may have increased at a faster rate than stock prices.

In 2023, Attijariwafa Bank was the largest company and financial institution in Morocco based on market capitalization. Its outstanding shares had a market value of around 15.63 billion U.S. dollars. The following leading enterprise in Morocco was the telecommunication company, Maroc Telecom, which had a market capitalization of roughly 11.2 billion U.S. dollars, while Managem, a Moroccan mining company, was valued at 6.2 billion U.S. dollars. Morocco’s titans of industry: Attijariwafa Bank and Maroc Telecom Attijariwafa Bank was the largest company in Morocco in 2023. The financial institution showed a remarkable increase in net income from 2020 to 2023. Furthermore, Attijariwafa Bank had 4,788 bank branches in Morocco and numerous branches in several African regions. In its turn, Maroc Telecom was the second-largest company and preeminent telecommunications firm in Morocco and holds most telecommunication towers in the nation. In 2021, the annual revenue of Maroc Telecom stood at 35.8 billion Moroccan dirhams (around 3.55 billion U.S. dollars). However, it represented a decrease from the previous year, when the company recorded a peak revenue of 36.7 billion Moroccan dirhams (3.64 billion U.S. dollars). Expanding the perspective to the African continent Taking a step back to compare Africa’s leading companies of 2023, both Attijariwafa Bank and Maroc Telecom made it to the list, ranking 14th and 19th, respectively. In 2020, as a result of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, large companies in Africa primarily sought financial solutions from commercial banks. According to a survey, 60 percent of the companies surveyed reported using commercial banks as their primary funding source.

As of May 2025, the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca was the leading company listed on the London Exchange (LSE), with a market capitalization of 159 billion British pounds. This made them the largest of all companies listed on the LSE. Seen as the heart of the global financial community, the London Stock Exchange is the second-largest stock market in Europe and ranks eighth globally. Key information The London Stock Exchange (LSE) is among the largest stock market operators globally and ranks 11th in terms of the oldest stock exchanges in existence, with 224 years of operation as of 2025. Performance after Covid The COVID-19 pandemic had a profound effect on the global economy, causing considerable volatility on the stock market. The London Stock Exchange (LSE) saw a notable decline in the market capitalization value of its listed companies, reaching its lowest value in March 2020 at approximately three trillion British pounds in correlation with a surge in the average daily number of trades, which peaked at over two billion. Following this initial reaction, the LSE observed a decrease in the average daily active traders, alongside a gradual recovery in the market capitalization of the listed companies.

*** was the leading company in Germany by market capitalization as of October 11, 2024, with almost *** billion U.S. dollars. *** was established in 1972 in Germany and is the largest software company in Europe. ******* and **************** followed, each with market capitalizations of approximately ****** and ****** billion U.S. dollars, respectively.

Among the Russian companies included in the Forbes Global 2000 ranking from 2022, Gazprom had the largest market value, measured at ** billion U.S. dollars. Another energy company, Rosneft, ranked second with a value of ** billion U.S. dollars. Gazprom, the most valuable company in Russia Headquartered in Moscow, Gazprom is responsible for the exploration, production, storage, processing, and exportation of crude oil, natural gas, and gas condensate. The company owns around ** trillion cubic meters of proved and probable natural gas reserves in Russia. Furthermore, it accounts for over two-thirds of gas production domestically. In 2021, Gazprom’s net revenue peaked at ***** trillion Russian rubles, having increased by over ** percent from the previous year. However, fear of profit losses due to Western sanctions imposed on the entity after the Russia-Ukraine war made Gazprom suspend paying out dividends to its shareholders for the first time since 1998. Natural resources are crucial to Russian companies’ success With the largest natural resources value in the world, companies in Russia are highly dependent on commodities such as coal, natural gas, oil, gold, timber, and rare earth metals. Public energy giants Gazprom and Rosneft were the highest earning companies in Russia in 2020. Another energy company, Lukoil, reported the highest revenue of *** billion Russian rubles among private companies in that year. Despite demonstrating lower figures, non-energy companies such as banks and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) retailers also made it to the top 10 companies by revenue in Russia.

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 **********************************************.

With a market cap of over two trillion U.S. dollars, Amazon ranks first among the leading large cap e-commerce companies worldwide. According to March 2025 data, the e-commerce giant ranks ahead of Alibaba and Pinduoduo. During the measured period, Alibaba's market cap amounted to over 300 billion U.S. dollars. Amazon is one of the most valuable brands worldwide Ranked fourth out of the leading brands worldwide, Amazon continues to grow, with its brand value estimated at 577 billion U.S. dollars. Amazon.com was founded in 1994 and has since become one of the world’s largest e-commerce retailers selling goods like books, clothing, electronics, and even having its own subscription service, Amazon Prime. In 2024, the company achieved a net sales revenue of 638 billion U.S. dollars, showing its continued profitability. Despite its worldwide popularity, Amazon’s annual net sales revenue is remarkably higher in North America (388 billion U.S. dollars) when compared to how the company performs internationally (143 billion U.S. dollars). A closer look at Amazon's third-party sellers Most of Amazon's units (62 percent) are sold by third-party (3P) sellers, meaning independent sellers who list and sell products on the marketplace but do not sell the products to the platform itself. In 2024, Amazon made 156 billion U.S. dollars in global net revenue from 3P sales alone. However, in Amazon's biggest market, the United States, most sellers use a hybrid model (74 percent), this includes both 3P and first-party (1P) sellers, with the latter being a business or manufacturer that sells its products directly to a retailer or platform.