How to read the advance GDP estimate, using the Q2 2026 revisions

When it comes out, and the three estimates

BEA releases GDP at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time, under embargo until that minute. Each quarter gets three regular estimates. For the second quarter of 2026 (April to June), the advance estimate came out on Thursday 30 July 2026, the second estimate on Wednesday 26 August 2026 and the third estimate on Wednesday 30 September 2026. BEA’s release schedule, checked on 21 October 2026, lists the third-quarter estimates on 29 October, 25 November and 23 December 2026, all at 8:30 a.m.

Each estimate replaces the one before it as more source data arrives. With the advance estimate BEA publishes a key source data and assumptions table, which shows where it has filled gaps with its own assumptions. The second estimate adds gross domestic income (GDI) and corporate profits. The third estimate fills in more survey data.

On top of that, an annual update revises several years at once. The 2026 update, published with the third estimate on 30 September 2026, covered the first quarter of 2021 through the first quarter of 2026. It moved first-quarter 2026 growth from 2.1% to 2.5%, an upward revision of 0.4 percentage point.

What the headline number is

The headline is the percent change in real GDP from the previous quarter, seasonally adjusted and expressed at an annual rate (SAAR). Real means adjusted for price changes: BEA measures output in chained 2017 dollars, its current reference year, so the figure tracks volume, not spending in today’s prices. Seasonally adjusted means the usual pattern within a year has been removed, so one quarter can be compared with the one before.

At an annual rate means the quarterly change is compounded over four quarters: the pace growth would run at for a full year if the quarter repeated. BEA states the quarterly change too. Its 30 September 2026 release gives second-quarter growth as 2.2% at an annual rate and 0.6% at a quarterly rate.

A year-over-year rate answers a different question: how the quarter compares with the same quarter a year earlier. It moves more slowly because it spans four quarters. Both appear on FRED, and they can differ by a lot when one quarter is unusually strong or weak.

A worked example: the second quarter of 2026 from the levels

FRED series GDPC1 carries BEA’s real GDP level in billions of chained 2017 dollars at an annual rate. Fetched on 21 October 2026, it shows 24,408.011 for the second quarter of 2026 and 24,274.383 for the first quarter. The arithmetic (our calculation):

Quarterly change: 24,408.011 ÷ 24,274.383 − 1 = 0.550%. BEA prints this as 0.6% at a quarterly rate.

Annualized: (24,408.011 ÷ 24,274.383)^4 − 1 = 1.00550^4 − 1 = 2.220%, published as 2.2%. FRED’s growth series A191RL1Q225SBEA shows the same 2.2%. Multiplying the quarterly change by four gives 2.20%, close here because the change is small; compounding matters more for larger moves.

Year over year: 24,408.011 ÷ 23,884.563 (second quarter of 2025) − 1 = 2.192%, which FRED’s series A191RO1Q156NBEA shows as 2.2%. In this quarter the annualized and year-over-year rates happen to round to the same figure. In the first quarter of 2026 they did not: 2.5% annualized against 2.6% over the year, on the same FRED series.

One caution for anyone redoing this later. The levels on FRED are the latest vintage, after the 30 September 2026 annual update, so they reproduce the third estimate, not the advance figure published on 30 July. Older vintages are kept on ALFRED, the St. Louis Fed’s archive.

Real, nominal and the GDP price index

Nominal, or current-dollar, GDP measures output at the prices of the day. FRED series GDP shows $32,563.030 billion at an annual rate for the second quarter of 2026 and $31,906.274 billion for the first. Annualized, (32,563.030 ÷ 31,906.274)^4 − 1 = 8.49%, matching the 8.5% in BEA’s 30 September 2026 release (our calculation).

The gap between nominal and real growth is price change. Dividing one growth factor by the other gives 1.0849 ÷ 1.0222 − 1 = 6.13%, in line with the 6.1% BEA published for both the GDP price index and the GDP implicit price deflator in the third estimate. A quarter can therefore show strong nominal growth and modest real growth, as this one did. The PCE price index in the same release rose 5.0%; that index, not the GDP price index, is the one the Fed’s 2% goal refers to, as our piece at /articles/how-to-read-the-us-cpi-report explains.

Contributions, and why net exports and inventories swing the total

BEA splits growth into contributions in percentage points, and they add up to the headline, give or take rounding. In the third estimate, consumer spending added 2.51 points, gross private investment 0.82 and government subtracted 0.01, while net exports subtracted 1.10: 2.51 + 0.82 − 1.10 − 0.01 = 2.22.

Imports are subtracted because GDP counts only what is produced in the US. Spending on imported goods is already inside consumption and investment, so BEA takes it out again. In the second quarter of 2026 exports added 0.56 points and imports subtracted 1.66, so a jump in imports showed up as a drag on GDP even though it reflected more domestic buying.

Inventories work in a similar way. GDP counts the change in private inventories, so a slower build than the quarter before subtracts from growth even if stocks are still rising. Within investment, fixed investment added 1.35 points and inventories subtracted 0.53. Strip inventories out and BEA’s final sales of domestic product rose 2.8%, against 2.2% for GDP. Real final sales to private domestic purchasers, consumer spending plus private fixed investment, rose 4.6%.

How the advance estimate was revised

Between 30 July and 26 August 2026 the headline did not move, but its parts did. BEA described an upward revision to consumer spending offset by an upward revision to imports: consumer spending went from 2.12 to 2.31 points and imports from −1.51 to −1.64.

The third estimate on 30 September 2026 raised growth by 0.7 percentage point, to 2.2%. BEA attributed it mainly to investment, consumer spending and government spending, and its technical notes name the source data: newer Census Bureau inventory and construction data, the Census Quarterly Services Survey, and updated seasonal factors for defense spending. In the table, inventories went from −0.72 to −0.53 points and government from −0.16 to −0.01.

The size of that move is worth setting against the rest of the release. The 0.7 point revision from advance to third estimate was larger than the 0.6 point gap between the advance figure of 1.5% and first-quarter growth of 2.1% as published on 30 July 2026. The revision history for each estimate is published in BEA’s vintage history file.

GDI and the statistical discrepancy

GDP adds up spending. Gross domestic income adds up the income earned producing that output: wages, profits, interest and the rest. In principle they are equal; in practice they are measured from different sources and differ. The gap, GDP minus GDI, is the statistical discrepancy. FRED series A030RC1Q027SBEA shows it at −$189.498 billion at an annual rate for the second quarter of 2026, which matches the nominal GDP of $32,563.030 billion less nominal GDI of $32,752.528 billion (FRED series GDI).

GDI first appears with the second estimate. Real GDI rose 2.2% in the 26 August 2026 estimate and 2.6% on 30 September 2026, and BEA’s average of real GDP and real GDI rose 2.4% in the third estimate. BEA publishes that average alongside both measures in its release table.

How to check the numbers yourself

Every figure above comes from public pages that anyone can open.

• Dates: bea.gov/news/schedule, or BEA’s calendar feed. The third-quarter 2026 advance estimate is listed for 29 October 2026 at 8:30 a.m.
• The releases: each BEA GDP release page links a full PDF, a historical comparisons spreadsheet with contributions, and a key source data and assumptions table.
• Levels and rates on FRED: GDPC1 (real GDP), GDP (nominal), A191RL1Q225SBEA (annualized real growth), A191RO1Q156NBEA (year-over-year), GDI and A030RC1Q027SBEA (statistical discrepancy). Contribution series include DPCERY2Q224SBEA (consumer spending), A006RY2Q224SBEA (investment), A019RY2Q224SBEA (net exports), A014RY2Q224SBEA (inventories) and A822RY2Q224SBEA (government).
• Redo the headline as (this quarter ÷ last quarter)^4 − 1 on the real levels, rounded to one decimal place.
• For the rest of the data calendar, see /articles/how-to-read-the-us-jobs-report-payrolls-and-unemployment and /articles/how-to-read-the-us-cpi-report; Treasury yields and the fed funds rate, with their dates, are on /rates.