Microsoft is the world’s largest company by market capitalization, with an outsized presence in multiple sectors, including cloud computing, gaming, productivity software, and, lately, artificial intelligence.
Microsoft’s broad array of products and services, as well as the recent stock price increase, begs the question of how high MSFT could reach in the future. According to different growth models, Microsoft stock is forecasted to surpass $1,000 by 2040 and potentially reach five digits by 2050.
Key highlights:
- Microsoft's stock has grown over +404,000% since 1986, reaching a high of $468 in May 2024 and a market cap of $3.3 trillion.
- Short-term forecasts suggest volatility, with MSFT potentially dropping below $300 before recovering in early 2025.
- Long-term predictions based on historical growth rates of MSFT predict the stock to hit $1,574 by 2040 and $3,681 by 2050.
- Based on the historical growth rate of the S&P 500 Index, MSFT could break $1,664 in 2040 and surpass $4,030 in 2050.
In this article, we are going to examine Microsoft stock forecasts for the medium and long term, accounting for the historical growth of important market indices and MSFT’s own historical performance.
But first, here’s an overview of Microsoft stock’s price growth under various relevant growth scenarios.
| 2025 | 2030 | 2040 | 2050 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MSFT stock forecast (Microsoft historical 8.87% ROI - last 25 yrs)* | $440 | $673 | $1,574 | $3,681 |
| MSFT stock forecast (S&P 500 historical 9.25% ROI - last 50 yrs)* | $441 | $687 | $1,664 | $4,030 |
| MSFT stock forecast (QTEC historical 15.5% ROI - last 10 yrs)* | $467 | $958 | $4,041 | $17,043 |
The values in the table were calculated using MSFT’s price of $404 (as of September 9th).
*S&P 500 has averaged 9.25% CAGR since 1974, QTEC 15.48% over the last 10 years, and MSFT 8.87% over the last 25 years.
Your capital is at risk.
Microsoft stock price history
When the company first started trading in 1986, Microsoft (MSFT) stock price was about 10 cents per share (accounting for several stock splits over the years). Now, more than 35 years later, MSFT is trading at $404, over +404,000% above its original price. Meanwhile, Microsoft’s market cap sits at $3 trillion. A quick stock profit calculation shows that even if you invested just $1,000 in MSFT in the early days, you would now sit on a profit of more than $4 million.
Interestingly, MSFT's price first reached $50 in 2000, but it would take more than 15 years before the stock revisited that price point in 2016. After that, Microsoft stock became a hot commodity, and the price exploded, reaching an all-time high of $468 in May 2024.
At the time of writing, Microsoft accounts for 6.9% of the entire weight of the S&P 500, an index measuring the value of the 500 largest US companies trading on the stock market. For context, the combined value of companies indexed by the S&P 500 is over $45 trillion.
Microsoft stock forecast 2024-2025
According to our Microsoft stock price prediction algorithm, MSFT’s price will face significant volatility in the next 12 months. The price is projected to decrease below $300 in the next six months and proceed to correct upwards, eventually establishing support around the $280 mark. MSFT stock is forecasted to change hands at around $240 a year from now.
Microsoft stock forecast 2025-2030
Microsoft stock price could hit $508 in 2025 and reach the quadruple-digit territory in 2028, increasing by over +151% and hitting $1,020.
Our Microsoft stock forecasts for 2025 through 2030 are based on the average yearly growth of Microsoft stock in the last 10 years. While this kind of analysis does have its drawbacks, it still provides valuable insight into how the stock might act in the future, particularly if the trends that have been present over the last 10 years persist going forward.
Microsoft stock forecast for 2040
Microsoft stock’s price increased from roughly $27 at the start of 1999 to $400 more than two decades later – that means that MSFT’s annualized return over the trailing 25-year period has been 8.9%.
Going by its historical growth to calculate long-term profits, Microsoft's stock price could increase to $1,574 by 2040.
Interestingly, Microsoft’s CAGR of 8.9% comes very close to the long-term average of the S&P 500 Index, which has on average gained +9.25% every year since 1974.
Although the S&P 500 can be a helpful gauge of a large-cap company's performance over a lengthy period, it evaluates businesses across various industries, ranging from finance to healthcare. Hence, it may not be the most appropriate indicator for forecasting the expansion of a technology company.
Given that Microsoft primarily operates in the tech industry, it is more fitting to rely on a tech-focused index fund like the NASDAQ-100-Technology Sector Index Fund (QTEC) to anticipate the future growth of one of the largest technology firms.
Over the last 10 years, QTEC has been growing at a 15.48% CAGR. If we use QTEC’s historical growth to project Microsft’s future growth, the price of MSFT would increase to $4,041 in 2040.
Microsoft stock forecast for 2050
Using Microsoft’s historical stock price performance as the basis for the long-term MSFT stock price prediction, Microsoft shares could reach $3,681 by 2050.
Accounting for such a stock price, Microsoft's market cap would grow beyond $27 trillion, which is over 9 times higher than it is today.
While this seems extremely unlikely at first glance, there are indications that the global economy could expand sufficiently to support such market capitalizations in the future. For context, the global gross domestic product (GDP) grew from 12 trillion in 1985 to $101 trillion in 2022, a 742% increase in 27 years. If that same GDP growth were to persist in the next 26 years, the global GDP would reach $850 trillion.
Your capital is at risk.
The bottom line: AI could help MSFT reach new heights in the coming years
Stock price forecasts for MSFT are notably bullish – there are several credible growth scenarios that put the price target for MSFT into quadruple digits. Given Microsoft’s encouraging business results in the past couple of years and its massive investment in AI (that is already paying off with the success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT), we can easily see why the company’s stock surpassing $1,000 is not out of the question.
For more long-term stock price analyses, you can check how much higher Tesla, Amazon, and Apple could reach by 2040 and 2050.
If you are instead interested in cryptocurrency forecasts, feel free to check our long-term prediction for Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano, and Solana
