Duolingo jumps 22.19% premarket as user growth speeds up and full-year outlook rises

Duolingo shares were up $28.40, or 22.19%, at $156.40 in premarket trading as of 9:19 a.m. ET on Wednesday, compared with Tuesday's regular-session price of $128.00. The stock had fallen 5.37% during Tuesday's session before the language-learning company reported results after the bell.

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Third-quarter revenue rose 14% from a year earlier to $309 million, ahead of the $303.04 million consensus cited by Investing.com. Daily active users climbed 29% to 64.9 million, speeding up from 23% growth in the second quarter, and monthly active users reached 153.1 million against an average analyst estimate of 148.53 million. Total bookings grew 12% to $316.1 million, and paid subscribers reached 13.1 million.

Not every line was a beat. Adjusted earnings of $0.54 a share came in below the $0.57 estimate, and adjusted EBITDA of $78.7 million worked out to a 25.5% margin, down from 29.5% a year earlier.

Investors focused on the outlook. Duolingo guided fourth-quarter bookings to $382 million and revenue to $322 million, and raised its full-year 2026 targets to bookings of $1.296 billion and revenue of $1.221 billion, with adjusted EBITDA of $323 million. The company also said it will retire its Duolingo Max tier, moving those subscribers to Super family plans at the same price.

"We had a great Q3, with DAU growth accelerating to 29% year over year, and all of our key financial metrics coming in ahead of expectations," co-founder and chief executive Luis von Ahn said in the release.