Big Tech

The Big Tech companies, also known as the tech giants or tech titans, are the largest and most influential technology companies in the world. The term Big Tech often refers to the largest six tech companies in the United States, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, and Nvidia, which are also the largest companies in the world by market capitalization. Other companies sometimes included in the group include Tesla, Oracle, and Netflix.
The term Big Tech is similar to other popular terms for large industries, such as Big Oil, Big Soda, or Big Tobacco. Big Tech can also include large Chinese tech companies like Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Xiaomi, collectively referred to as BATX.

History

In the late 20th century, IBM, Microsoft, and Apple dominated the worldwide information technology industry. After the dot-com bubble wiped out most of the Nasdaq Composite stock market index, surviving tech startups expanded their market share and became dominant in their markets. The term Big Tech began to appear around 2013, when some economists speculated that a lack of regulation could lead to concentrated market power. The term Big Tech became popular following the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, because access to a large amount of data allowed tech companies to influence their users. The concept of Big Tech is similar to how the largest oil companies were called Big Oil following the 1970s energy crisis, and the largest cigarette producers were called Big Tobacco, as Congress attempted to regulate those industries. It is also similar to how, at the beginning of the 21st century, the mainstream media became dominated by a small number of corporations called Big Media or the media giants.

Companies

Alphabet

is the parent company of Google, which operates several of the world's most widely used internet services. As of 2024, Google is a major provider of online advertising, web search, video sharing, email, web browsers, web mapping, mobile operating systems, and cloud storage. Its cloud computing division, Google Cloud Platform, ranks third in global market share behind Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Google and Meta are often referred to as a digital advertising duopoly. Advertising accounted for 82% of Google's revenue in 2021.
Alphabet is involved in various research and development initiatives in emerging technology fields including artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and autonomous vehicles. In 2019, Google announced that its Sycamore processor had achieved quantum supremacy. In 2021, Alphabet's subsidiary Waymo launched public robotaxi services in the United States.
Alphabet reached a market capitalization of $1 trillion for the first time in January 2020, becoming the fourth U.S. company to do so.

Amazon

is one of the largest global e-commerce companies and operates several other business lines, including cloud computing, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. As of 2024, Amazon accounts for 38% of e-commerce market share in the United States. The company's Amazon Web Services division is one of the most widely used cloud platforms and has generated the majority of Amazon's operating profit since 2014.
Amazon was the second U.S. company after Apple to reach a $1 trillion market cap, briefly doing so in 2018 and again in early 2020. It closed above that threshold for the first time in April 2020. Although Amazon's valuation fell below $1 trillion in late 2022, it recovered in 2023 and surpassed $2 trillion in June 2024.

Apple

designs and sells electronics and software, including the iPhone, Mac computers, and the Apple Watch. It also offers services such as the App Store, iCloud, and Apple Music. Apple and Google form a mobile operating system duopoly, with iOS holding 27% global market share and Android 72%.
In August 2018, Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company to reach a $1 trillion market capitalization. It reached $2 trillion in August 2020 and $3 trillion in January 2022—the first U.S. company to reach each of those milestones. Apple briefly fell below $2 trillion in January 2023 but again closed above $3 trillion later that year.

Microsoft

develops desktop operating systems, productivity software, and enterprise and cloud services. As of 2024, its products include Microsoft Windows, the Microsoft Office suite, and Microsoft Teams for business communication. Microsoft is also the second-largest cloud provider through Microsoft Azure, after Amazon. It also owns Microsoft Gaming, one of the largest companies in the video game industry.
Microsoft reached a $1 trillion market cap in April 2019, crossed $2 trillion in June 2021, and in October 2021 briefly overtook Apple as the most valuable publicly traded U.S. company.

Nvidia

is a software and fabless semiconductor company that designs and supplies graphics processing units, application programming interfaces for data science and high-performance computing, and system on a chip units for mobile computing and automotive markets. Nvidia is the dominant supplier of hardware and software used by artificial intelligence systems.
Nvidia reached a $1 trillion market capitalization in May 2023, and by late 2024, it had surpassed both Amazon and Alphabet in market value. Nvidia subsequently became the most valuable publicly traded company in the world.

Other companies

Several other publicly traded U.S. companies are occasionally associated with Big Tech due to their market capitalization, product reach, or cultural influence. These include Adobe, AMD, Broadcom, Cisco, IBM, Intel, Micron, Netflix, OpenAI, Oracle, Salesforce, Tesla, and Uber.

Tesla

is primarily an automaker, which has led to debate over its categorization as a technology company. In 2022, Fortune included Tesla in its coverage of Big Tech, and The Washington Post likened Tesla vehicles to iPhones in terms of ecosystem integration. Critics, including analysts at Business Insider, argue Tesla should be classified strictly as an automaker. Barron's acknowledged Tesla's position as a tech firm but emphasized that its business model differs from that of traditional IT companies. Part of the rationale for Tesla's inclusion among technology companies stems from its investments in artificial intelligence and autonomous driving, and robotics technologies. Yahoo Finance and Reuters have both noted that Tesla's stock performance has been increasingly decoupled from its vehicle sales and more closely tied to its technological ambitions.
Tesla first reached a $1 trillion market capitalization in October 2021. Its valuation declined during the 2022 stock market decline, dropping from $1.3 trillion in November 2021 to $495 billion by the end of 2022, including a 40% loss in December alone. The company again surpassed a $1 trillion valuation in November 2024, before a decline throughout the first quarter of 2025.

Asian companies

The large Chinese tech companies Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Xiaomi, collectively referred to as BATX, have also been referred to as Big Tech. Some commentators have debated whether ByteDance, DJI, JD.com, Meituan, NetEase, SMIC, and automakers BYD and Geely are part of a larger group.
South Korean tech conglomerate Samsung and Taiwanese chip manufacturer TSMC have also been referred to as Big Tech.

Nicknames

Acronyms

Acronyms such as FANG, FANG+, FAANG, FAANG+, GAFA, GAFAM, MAMAA, GAMMA, MAGA, and others have been used to refer to the Big Tech companies. Alphabet, the parent company of Google, may be represented by G in these acronyms, and Meta, the rebranding of Facebook, may be represented by F.
The acronym FANG was coined in 2013 by Jim Cramer, to refer to Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google. Cramer called these companies "totally dominant in their markets". Cramer stated that the four companies were poised to "take a bite out of" the declining market, giving a double meaning to the acronym, according to Cramer's colleague at RealMoney.com, Bob Lang. Cramer expanded FANG to FAANG in 2017, adding Apple to the list because its revenue made it a potential Fortune 500 company.
Following Facebook's name change to Meta Platforms in October 2021, as well as the 2015 creation of Google holding company Alphabet, Cramer suggested replacing FAANG with MAMAA, replacing Netflix with Microsoft because Netflix's valuation had fallen behind the other companies. With Microsoft, these companies were each valued at over compared to Netflix's. In November 2021, The Motley Fool suggested MANAMANA as an acronym that stands for Microsoft, Apple, Netflix, Alphabet, Meta, Amazon, Nvidia, and Adobe., acronyms for Big Tech have fallen out of use; there is no acronym for the Big Six.
At the international level, Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Xiaomi, collectively referred to as BATX, are often seen as Chinese competitors to Big Tech. Futurist Amy Webb referred to the combination of the Big Five, IBM, Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent "G-MAFIA BAT".

Big Four

In the early 2010s, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and Meta were referred to as the Big Four, The Four, the Gang of Four, and the Four Horsemen. Eric Schmidt, Phil Simon, and Scott Galloway grouped the Big Four together based on their ability to create social change. They serve billions of users, and are able to influence user behavior and control large amounts of user data. As such, they have been criticized for creating a new economic order called surveillance capitalism. According to Simon and Galloway, this distinguishes them from other Big Tech companies such as Microsoft and IBM.
In 2011, Google executive chair Eric Schmidt excluded Microsoft from the group, stating, "Microsoft is not driving the consumer revolution in the minds of the consumers." In the late 2010s, Microsoft changed its business strategy, causing its market value to increase, leading to its widespread inclusion in Big Tech and creating the term Big Five.