The news: LinkedIn grew revenues 9% YoY in its quarter ending June 30, maintaining its upward trajectory despite a mixed hiring environment. While overall job postings remain soft compared with the tech boom years, the platform has leaned into engagement, advertising, and AI to bolster results.
Satya Nadella, CEO of parent Microsoft, emphasized the platform’s transformation from a digital resume archive into a more dynamic business hub, noting increases in both content creation and time spent in-app; Sessions grew 11% YoY, fueled by a richer mix of content and creator activity. The platform is supporting greater creator activity through deeper analytics tools.
On the monetization side, LinkedIn continues to benefit from robust demand in B2B advertising, adding new features and formats, particularly on the video/CTV front. We forecast LinkedIn to reach $7.7 billion in ad revenues this year.
Microsoft has infused AI across the experience—from post development to recruiter tools—helping automate tasks and surface higher-quality content and candidates. These tools are already increasing user utility and advertising value across the board.
Why it matters: While some social platforms struggle with shifting algorithms and advertiser skepticism, LinkedIn is proving to be a steady performer with a clearly differentiated value proposition. In an era of heightened scrutiny around user identity, LinkedIn’s verified, business-first audience gives it an advantage in trust and targeting—especially for B2B campaigns.
Its blend of hiring tools, educational content, and professional networking creates a self-reinforcing loop: More engagement boosts content creation, which in turn drives ad impressions and higher session lengths. AI accelerates this flywheel by reducing friction, automating previously tedious tasks, and encouraging experimentation among both users and advertisers.
This quarter’s performance also suggests that LinkedIn is evolving beyond cyclical hiring patterns. Even in a cooler labor market, it continues to grow by expanding its use cases—from learning to branding to thought leadership. It’s becoming less of a recruitment tool and more of a daily utility for working professionals.
Our take: Although Microsoft did outpace LinkedIn on revenues during the quarter, the professional platform (despite recent layoffs) has quietly become one of the tech giant’s most reliable segments. LinkedIn benefits from consistency, credibility, and clear differentiation—traits increasingly rare in social media.
Its AI-assisted features are more than gimmicks; they’re helping users create, connect, and convert with less effort and more precision. If Microsoft can keep growing both sides of the business—ads and engagement—LinkedIn could emerge not just as a recruitment powerhouse, but as the default professional platform for the AI-powered era.