OpenAI Puts GPT-6 Astra on Google Cloud, Completing Sweep of Big Three Cloud Providers

OpenAI will start selling its most advanced AI models and its Codex coding tool through Google Cloud within weeks, the two companies said Wednesday. This deal will make OpenAI's technology available through all three of the largest cloud platforms in the United States. It also brings two major AI competitors closer together.

Under the deal, OpenAI's latest models, including GPT-6 Astra, will be available in Google Cloud's Model Garden and through the Google Cloud Marketplace. Customers can use money they have already agreed to spend on Google Cloud to pay for these products, according to a company blog post. The models will also be available in Google's Antigravity development environment and Gemini Agent. They are expected to become generally available in the coming weeks.

The deal gives companies in industries with strict rules a way to use OpenAI's models through Google Cloud. These companies can use Google's tools to control who has access, manage their data and run their systems. The two companies said this would help customers build AI systems that can carry out tasks with less human help, known as agentic AI workflows.

For OpenAI, this is the latest step in its effort to make its products available to more customers. That effort began after its exclusive licensing deal with Microsoft ended in April. Amazon Web Services began hosting OpenAI models the next day, and Amazon has since added more models to its Bedrock platform. Neither company has said how much extra business that deal has brought in.

The Google deal adds another layer to a relationship that has mostly been competitive. OpenAI was founded in 2015 partly to challenge Google's strong position in AI research. Today, the two companies compete in both AI models and search. But building and running large AI models takes huge amounts of money and computing power, which has pushed them to work together. Last year, OpenAI said it was using Google's cloud to run ChatGPT and its application programming interface. Google also signed a cloud deal to provide OpenAI with more computing power.

Google has been rebuilding its cloud business around the idea of supporting different AI models. According to CNBC, the business's annualized revenue growth rose to about 82% in the second quarter, up from 63% in the first quarter. Demand for AI models and custom chips helped drive this growth. Amazon and Microsoft reported cloud growth of 37% and 42%, respectively, in the second quarter. All three companies are due to report their quarterly results next week.

Thomas Kurian, chief executive of Google Cloud, has described the platform as open to any model that developers like to use. This approach allows Google to sell competitors' products alongside its own Gemini models. Google introduced its next-generation Gemini 4 Argon model in September.

"For Google, I read the deal as confidence, because Gemini now has to win those customers with OpenAI sitting right next to it," Mike Leone, vice president and analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, told Axios. He added that Google is unlikely to lose Gemini customers because of the deal. Customers still pay for Google's cloud platform, data services and security, no matter which models they use.

OpenAI presented the deal as proof of the value of Google's infrastructure. "Google Cloud's longstanding investment in machine learning and AI has made it a destination for AI workloads and the developers and data scientists building them," the company said in its blog post.

The deal reflects a wider change in the AI industry. The largest cloud providers have become the main way for companies that build advanced AI models to sell their products. These cloud providers usually take a share of sales made through their platforms. According to Anthropic's initial public offering filing, reviewed by Reuters, 47% of its 2025 revenue came from Amazon and Google cloud platforms. Anthropic is an OpenAI competitor backed by Amazon and Google.

But making models available is only one part of the competition. OpenAI must still convince businesses to choose its models over those from Google, Anthropic and other companies available on the same platforms. This makes the cloud providers' existing business relationships and computing systems more important.

"Once every cloud has the top models, I think the competitive advantage goes to whoever does the best job with a company's data, governance, and costs," Leone said.

The competition is becoming more important for both sides. Data from corporate card company Ramp shows that most business spending on AI goes to OpenAI and Anthropic, although some corporate IT teams have added Gemini to their systems. Meanwhile, OpenAI is seeking investors at a valuation of $1.4 trillion and is planning an initial public offering.

For Google, the deal brings in business computing work that might otherwise have gone to AWS or Microsoft Azure. It also builds on a relationship that began with a contract to provide computing power. For OpenAI, the deal removes one reason businesses might have needed to work with a separate provider just to use its models.

Item	Detail
Models covered	GPT-6 Astra and other frontier models, plus Codex coding agent
Sales channels	Google Cloud Model Garden and Google Cloud Marketplace
Payment mechanism	Existing Google Cloud spending commitments
Additional surfaces	Antigravity development environment, Gemini Agent
Availability	General availability planned in the coming weeks
Cloud coverage	Google Cloud, AWS, Microsoft Azure

Note: The companies announced these details on Wednesday.