Google parent company Alphabet has reported almost $57 billion USD in revenue for the fourth quarter of 2020, driven by a recovery in ad spending.

Revenue over Q4, including the holiday season, increased 23 per cent year on year from $43.2 billion in Q4 2019. Net income was $15.2 billion USD.

Ruth Porat, CFO of Google and Alphabet, hailed a comeback in ad revenues, with advertising units bringing in $46.2 billion over the three months to December 31.

“Our strong fourth quarter performance, with revenues of $56.9 billion, was driven by Search and YouTube, as consumer and business activity recovered from earlier in the year.

“Google Cloud revenues were $13.1 billion for 2020, with significant ongoing momentum, and we remain focused on delivering value across the growth opportunities we see,” she said.

Revenues in the Asia-Pacific region jumped 30 per cent in constant currency, from $7.48 billion in Q4 2019 to $9.75 billion in Q4 2020.

It was also a good fiscal year for Alphabet, which brought in $182.5 billion total revenue and net income of $40.27 billion over 2020. One weak point was Cloud, however, which lost $5.6 billion USD last year.