Summary
CrowdStrike reported first quarter fiscal 2025 revenue of $921.0 million, up 33.0% from the prior-year quarter. Gross profit was $696.0 million, up 33.0%, and gross margin was 75.6%, flat versus the prior-year quarter. The company swung to GAAP operating income of $6.9 million from a prior-year operating loss, and operating margin was 0.8%, up 3.6 percentage points. Net income attributable to CrowdStrike was $42.8 million, up from the prior-year quarter. Diluted EPS was $0.17, up $0.17. On a non-GAAP basis, income from operations was $198.7 million, net income attributable to CrowdStrike was $231.7 million, and diluted EPS was $0.93.
The quarter's operational momentum centered on annual recurring revenue. ARR reached $3.65 billion as of April 30, 2024, up 33% year over year. Net new ARR was $211.7 million, up 22% year over year. Module adoption rates were 65% for five or more modules, 44% for six or more modules, and 28% for seven or more modules. Deferred revenue was $3.07 billion, up 27.7%. Remaining performance obligations were $4.70 billion, up 42.4%. Backlog was approximately $1.7 billion, and headcount was 8,429 full-time employees. Management said the dollar-based net retention rate was consistent with expectations.
Cash generation stayed strong. Operating cash flow was $383.2 million, up 27.4%. Capital expenditures were $49.7 million, down 20.2%. Free cash flow was $322.5 million, or 35% of revenue. The company cited a rule of 68 on a free cash flow basis. Management framed the quarter around platform consolidation, with customers adding modules and endpoints, and pointed to product launches such as Falcon Next-Gen SIEM, Falcon Application Security Posture Management, and Falcon for Defender, plus expanded partnerships with AWS, Google Cloud, NVIDIA, Tata Consultancy Services, and HCLTech.
Guidance points to continued growth. For the second quarter of fiscal 2025, CrowdStrike guided non-GAAP income from operations to $208.3 million to $210.5 million and non-GAAP net income attributable to CrowdStrike to $245.7 million to $247.8 million. Second quarter non-GAAP diluted EPS is guided to $0.98 to $0.99. For the full fiscal year 2025, non-GAAP income from operations is guided to $890.1 million to $916.5 million, non-GAAP net income attributable to CrowdStrike is guided to $985.6 million to $1,012.0 million, and non-GAAP diluted EPS is guided to $3.93 to $4.03. The company also issued revenue guidance for both the second quarter and the full fiscal year. The guidance excludes stock-based compensation, amortization of acquired intangibles, acquisition-related items, and other adjustments.
Risks remain familiar for a high-growth security platform. CrowdStrike faces an intensely competitive market, rapid growth execution challenges, and risks tied to new products, including defects, errors, or vulnerabilities. Sales cycles can be long and unpredictable. The company must attract new customers and retain existing ones while integrating acquisitions and achieving market acceptance for new and existing offerings. It also depends on collaboration and integration with third-party products. Broader market, political, economic, and business conditions could pressure results, including macroeconomic deterioration, inflation, geopolitical uncertainty and conflicts, public health crises, and volatility in the banking and financial services sector. Seasonality matters: net new ARR generation is typically greater in the second half of the year, particularly in the fourth quarter, and operating margin is typically lower in the first half because of payroll taxes and annual sales and marketing events. Backlog is not necessarily indicative of future revenue, and the dollar-based net retention rate can fluctuate with large customer contracts. Management also noted that a material reversal of the U.S. valuation allowance is reasonably possible in the foreseeable future.
Forecast
Reported figures
GAAP, from SEC filings| Metric | Q1 FY2025 | Q4 FY2024 | QoQ | Q1 FY2024 | YoY |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $921.0M | $845.3M | +9.0% | $692.6M | +33.0% |
| Gross profit | $696.0M | $636.8M | +9.3% | $523.4M | +33.0% |
| Gross margin | 75.6% | 75.3% | +0.2 pp | 75.6% | ±0.0 pp |
| Research & development | $235.2M | $214.0M | +9.9% | $179.1M | +31.4% |
| Sales & marketing | $350.1M | $290.4M | +20.6% | $281.1M | +24.5% |
| General & administrative | $103.7M | $102.7M | +1.0% | $82.6M | +25.5% |
| Total operating expenses | $689.1M | $607.1M | +13.5% | $542.8M | +27.0% |
| Operating income (loss) | $6.9M | $29.7M | -76.6% | -$19.5M | +135.6% |
| Operating margin | 0.8% | 3.5% | -2.8 pp | -2.8% | +3.6 pp |
| Net income (loss) | $46.3M | $54.9M | -15.8% | $499.0K | +9171.3% |
| Net margin | 5.0% | 6.5% | -1.5 pp | 0.1% | +4.9 pp |
| Diluted EPS | $0.17 | $0.23 | -$0.06 | $0.00 | +$0.17 |
Risks
Competition risk is materially expanded around AI: competitors may more successfully incorporate AI into their products, gain or leverage superior access to certain AI technologies, and achieve higher market acceptance of their AI solutions, which could weaken CrowdStrike's competitive position and pricing power.
Deterioration in general economic conditions, including geopolitical environment, inflation, interest-rate increases, and volatility in banking and financial services, has caused and may cause customers to delay or cut security and IT spending, lengthen sales cycles, increase churn, and require more flexible payment terms.
As a cybersecurity provider, CrowdStrike has been and expects to continue to be specifically targeted by bad actors, including sophisticated cyber adversaries and nation-state actors, and such efforts may intensify as geopolitical tensions increase; a compromise of its systems or data could be especially detrimental to reputation and customer confidence.
The vast majority of Falcon platform sales flow through channel partners, and loss of a substantial number of channel partners or failure to recruit additional partners could limit CrowdStrike's ability to market, sell, and distribute the platform.
Headcount grew from 4,965 employees as of January 31, 2022 to 8,429 as of April 30, 2024, and failure to effectively attract, integrate, and retain new employees, particularly in sales and marketing and research and development, could impair management of growth and platform quality.
Future success is highly dependent on George Kurtz, President and CEO, and other key personnel; employees work at-will, and competition for experienced cybersecurity sales professionals and engineers is intense, with the incident response and proactive services team small and difficult to replace.
CrowdStrike hosts its Falcon platform using a mix of third-party data centers, primarily AWS, and its own colocation data centers; service interruptions, AWS renegotiation on less favorable terms, or failure of redundancy and disaster recovery could harm customer retention and reputation.
Future growth depends in part on increasing sales to government organizations, which are subject to budgetary uncertainty, long sales cycles, FedRAMP certification maintenance, security clearance requirements, and audits that could restrict or delay purchases.
International customers accounted for approximately 32% of total revenue for the three months ended April 30, 2024, exposing CrowdStrike to regulatory, tax, anti-bribery, data localization, and foreign-exchange risks as it expands internationally.
The revolving facility and indenture governing the Senior Notes contain restrictive covenants and cross-default provisions that limit indebtedness, asset dispositions, liens, and affiliate transactions, and a breach could accelerate repayment or force bankruptcy or liquidation.
Professional services gross margin decreased by 6% for the three months ended April 30, 2024 compared to the three months ended April 30, 2023, primarily due to decreased utilization, which could pressure overall results if services remain a lead generator.
Net new ARR generation is typically greater in the second half of the fiscal year, particularly in the fourth quarter, and operating margin is typically lower in the first half due to payroll taxes and annual sales and marketing events, causing results to fluctuate and potentially miss expectations.
The Flow Security acquisition for $96.4 million net of cash acquired in the three months ended April 30, 2024 illustrates CrowdStrike's acquisition strategy; integration may divert management, fail to identify liabilities, or cause write-offs and dilution.
Large customer contracts in a given period may reduce dollar-based net retention rate in subsequent periods if the customer makes a larger upfront purchase and does not continue to increase the size of their purchases.
SaaS KPIs
All quarters →Free Cash Flow Margin
Non-GAAP Operating Margin
Net New ARR
Free Cash Flow
Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)
Backlog
Module Adoption Rate (6+ modules)
Module Adoption Rate (7+ modules)
Module Adoption Rate (5+ modules)
Summary, forecast, risks and KPIs are extracted from CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc.'s SEC filings for Q1 FY2025 (10-Q / 10-K and the 8-K earnings release); GAAP figures in the summary are checked against the reported XBRL data. They can contain errors; the filings are authoritative. Processed Oct 2, 2026.