Meta: Still room to run in the AI era?

When investors think about the biggest beneficiaries of AI, Nvidia, OpenAI and the semiconductor names often come first.

But Meta has something many AI challengers don’t: billions of existing users, enormous cash flows and products people already open every day.

Now, it’s trying to weave AI through all of them.

Meta’s Q2 2026 revenue rose 28% year-on-year to US$60.8 billion, while its Family of Apps averaged 3.6 billion daily active people. investor.atmeta.com

That combination of scale and distribution could be Meta’s biggest advantage in the next phase of AI.

Meet Muse

One of Meta’s most important recent launches is Muse, its new personal AI agent.

Unlike a traditional chatbot that waits for individual prompts, Meta is positioning Muse as an AI that can take actions across different services on your behalf.

It can connect to services including Spotify, DoorDash and Uber, for example, allowing users to ask it to build a playlist, order food or arrange a ride. Meta has also begun integrating Muse into WhatsApp and is bringing it to its AI glasses. about.fb.com

The bigger idea is that AI becomes less of a destination you visit and more of a layer sitting across your digital life.

And Meta has a powerful distribution advantage.

It doesn’t need to persuade billions of people to download an entirely new platform. It already has Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger — alongside a growing hardware business.

If Muse becomes genuinely useful within those products, Meta has multiple ways to monetise it over time.

From consumers to businesses

Muse isn’t only aimed at individuals.

Meta has also launched Muse for Small Business, allowing businesses to connect the AI agent to Facebook, Instagram and their Meta advertising accounts, alongside services including Shopify, Stripe, Canva and QuickBooks. about.fb.com

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Meta ad accounts
• Shopify
• Stripe
• Canva
• QuickBooks

A business could ask Muse to analyse sales, understand which marketing campaigns are working or help create the next one.

Meta has also launched its Enterprise Platform, taking its AI models and agents further into the workplace. about.fb.com

This matters because Meta’s AI opportunity is becoming broader than one consumer chatbot.

It’s building an ecosystem spanning consumers, businesses, advertising, enterprise software and hardware.

• Consumers
• Businesses
• Advertising
• Enterprise software
• Hardware

Don’t forget the machine Meta already owns

Then there is advertising.

Meta generated US$59.4 billion in advertising revenue in Q2, up 27% year-on-year. Ad impressions rose 14% while the average price per ad increased 12%. investor.atmeta.com

AI can potentially make that existing engine more efficient — improving recommendations, targeting, creative generation and campaign optimisation.

That’s an important distinction.

Meta doesn’t need every AI investment to create a completely new revenue stream. If AI simply makes Instagram more engaging or its advertising more effective, it can strengthen businesses that already generate tens of billions of dollars every quarter.

The next screen after the smartphone?

Meta is also making a longer-term bet on where we interact with AI.

At its September Connect conference, it expanded its AI glasses portfolio to more than 100 styles and announced that Muse is coming to the devices. about.fb.com

This is potentially significant.

If AI agents become something we speak to throughout the day, glasses could become a natural interface: seeing what you see, hearing what you hear and responding without requiring you to pull out a phone.

It’s still an early bet.

But Meta spent years building social platforms on hardware controlled by Apple and Google. Owning the next major computing interface would fundamentally change that relationship.

The catch: AI is expensive

Meta’s ambitions aren’t cheap.

The company spent more than US$31 billion on capital expenditure in Q2 alone and expects US$130–145 billion of capex across 2026. Costs are rising quickly enough that despite revenue growing 28%, Q2 operating income actually fell 8%. investor.atmeta.com

That’s arguably the key risk for investors.

Meta can afford to spend aggressively. The question is whether those investments ultimately generate returns large enough to justify it.

What should Singapore investors consider?

For Singapore investors, Meta may already be sitting inside your portfolio through an S&P 500, Nasdaq or global technology ETF. Before adding the individual stock, it’s worth understanding your existing exposure.

There is also currency risk: Meta trades and reports in US dollars, while most Singapore investors ultimately spend in SGD.

But the more interesting long-term question is:

Can Meta turn its enormous existing distribution into an advantage in AI?

The company doesn’t need to build an audience from scratch. It already has billions of users, a powerful advertising business, relationships with businesses around the world and increasingly, its own hardware.

Muse adds another layer to that ecosystem.

If Meta can successfully connect those pieces, its next phase of growth may come not from one breakthrough AI product, but from AI quietly making almost everything it already owns more useful and more valuable.

The risk is the extraordinary amount of money required to get there.

For investors, that may be the trade-off to watch: how quickly Meta’s AI ambitions can turn today’s spending into tomorrow’s earnings.