TLDR
- NIO reports Q1 2026 earnings on May 21, before the opening bell.
- Wall Street expects a loss of $0.08–$0.24 per share, but a big improvement from a year ago.
- Q1 deliveries hit 83,465 vehicles, up 98.3% year-over-year, beating guidance.
- Revenue is expected to come in around $3.55–$3.74 billion, up more than 110% year-over-year.
- Options traders are pricing in roughly an 8.4% move in the stock following results.
NIO stock was trading around $5.73 at the time of writing, up roughly 15–20% year to date, outperforming Chinese EV peers Li Auto and XPeng.
The company will post Q1 2026 results before the market opens on Wednesday, May 21. This is one of the more anticipated EV earnings reports of the quarter.
Wall Street’s consensus puts the Q1 loss at somewhere between $0.08 and $0.24 per share, depending on the estimate source. Either way, that’s a meaningful improvement from the $0.44–$0.45 loss reported in Q1 2025.
Revenue expectations sit between $3.55 billion and $3.74 billion, which would represent year-over-year growth of roughly 114–124%. The main engine behind that jump is vehicle deliveries.
NIO delivered 83,465 vehicles in the quarter, up 98.3% from the same period a year ago. That came in above its own guidance range of 80,000–83,000 units. The NIO brand accounted for 58,543 of those deliveries, with ONVO contributing 13,339 and Firefly adding 11,583.
For context, peer XPeng delivered 62,682 vehicles in Q1, down from 94,008 a year ago. Li Auto reported 95,142 deliveries, up only slightly from 92,864.
Margins Under Pressure
The trickier part of the story is margins. Costs for chips, copper, lithium, and other EV inputs remain elevated, in part due to AI-driven semiconductor demand and ongoing geopolitical pressure. These factors are expected to weigh on gross margins and could push NIO back into a net loss after its first-ever quarterly profit in Q4 2025.
NIO trades at a forward price-to-sales ratio of roughly 0.7, which sits below both Li Auto and XPeng on that metric.
Options traders are pricing in a move of about 8.4% in either direction following the earnings report. That is higher than NIO’s average post-earnings move of 5.78% over the previous four quarters.
What’s Driving Long-Term Optimism
The third-generation ES8 has been a standout performer. It reached 100,000 deliveries in just 215 days, a record for vehicles priced above 400,000 yuan in China. The model made up more than 54% of NIO’s total deliveries in Q1.
The upcoming ES9 SUV is already open for pre-sales at a starting price of 528,000 yuan, with deliveries set to begin June 1. The model features 43 industry-first technologies, according to the company.
$NIO #NIO to showcase ES9’s SkyRide intelligent chassis system hrs before Q1 earnings report on May21st, ES9 is scheduled to launch on May27th w/ price starting at RMB588k for the Signature Edition installed w/ suspension systemhttps://t.co/4cvxfeLPvV https://t.co/HIVxXVbeOs pic.twitter.com/HZRqSLVwyN
— Nio (@NioStrats) May 20, 2026
NIO’s battery-swap network now includes more than 3,800 stations and over 28,000 charging points. Its Battery-as-a-Service model lowers upfront costs for buyers.
Management’s margin targets are 20–25% for the NIO brand, above 15% for ONVO, and above 10% for Firefly. Those targets are not expected to be hit immediately.
For full-year 2026, analysts expect revenue of $18.7 billion, up 52% year-over-year. The 2026 loss per share consensus sits at $0.22, improving from $0.98 in 2025.
NIO currently holds a Moderate Buy consensus on TipRanks, based on four Buys, two Holds, and one Sell from analysts over the past three months. The average 12-month price target implies about 8% upside from current levels.
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