Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting History (1994 to 2026)
The Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting began in a theater with 2,750 seats in 1994. By 2015 more than 40,000 people came to Omaha, and since 2016 anyone can watch it online. This page tells that story in numbers: the venues, the crowds, the BRK.A price at each meeting, the questions and the people who asked them.
Want to read what Buffett, Munger and Abel said? We have full transcripts of every meeting since 1994. Going yourself? Our Berkshire meeting guide covers the next meeting.
- Biggest crowds: about 40,000 people in 2015, Buffett wrote in his letter. In 1994 the meeting just overfilled a theater with 2,750 seats.
- Same arena since 2004: CHI Health Center, first called Qwest Center and then CenturyLink Center.
- Monday meetings: 1994 to 1999. Since 2000 the meeting has been on a Saturday.
- Online only: 2020 and 2021, because of Covid. The 2021 meeting came from Los Angeles.
- BRK.A at the meeting: $15,450 in 1994, $710,300 in 2026.
- Questions since 1994: 1,803 in our transcripts of 33 meetings. The askers came from 41 countries.
- First livestream: 2016, on Yahoo Finance. CNBC has carried the meeting since 2022.
in five guides
How did the Berkshire meeting change from 1994 to 2026?
TL;DR: From a theater with 2,750 seats in 1994 to an arena with overflow rooms for 40,000 people. Since 2004 the meeting has used the same building.
The meeting moved four times in its first ten years, each time to a bigger hall. Since 2004 it has used the same arena in downtown Omaha. The name changed twice: Qwest Center, then CenturyLink Center, then CHI Health Center. In 2020 Buffett spoke to an empty arena, and in 2021 the meeting came online from Los Angeles.
Attendance is an estimate. Berkshire does not publish an official count. The best numbers come from Buffett himself, in his letters. Rough estimates, from the press or our own, show in a lighter color.
Where was each meeting, and how many people came?
TL;DR: One row per meeting: venue, crowd, BRK.A price at the meeting and the market backdrop. The year opens our transcript. All venues are in Omaha except 2021.
| Year | Venue | People | BRK.A | Market |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | CHI Health Center | 12,000 to 16,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $710,300 | Buffett hands over |
| 2025 | CHI Health Center | about 40,000 Buffett at the meeting | $809,350 | Tariff shock |
| 2024 | CHI Health Center | 30,000 to 40,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $603,000 | AI rally, high rates |
| 2023 | CHI Health Center | 30,000 to 40,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $491,840 | Bank failures |
| 2022 | CHI Health Center | 30,000 to 40,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $484,340 | Inflation, Ukraine war |
| 2021 | online, from Los Angeles | online only | $412,500 | Stimulus, meme stocks |
| 2020 | CHI Health Center no shareholders, streamed | online only | $273,975 | COVID crash |
| 2019 | CHI Health Center | about 40,000 berkshire_other | $327,766 | Trade war |
| 2018 | CenturyLink Center | more than 40,000 press | $292,600 | Corporate tax cut |
| 2017 | CenturyLink Center | about 42,000 press | $250,000 | Brexit, Trump election |
| 2016 | CenturyLink Center | about 37,000 Buffett letter | $219,000 | First hike since 2006 |
| 2015 | CenturyLink Center | more than 40,000 Buffett letter | $215,800 | Oil price crash |
| 2014 | CenturyLink Center | a record 39,000 Buffett letter | $192,255 | Bull market |
| 2013 | CenturyLink Center | more than 30,000 press | $162,904 | QE3, fiscal cliff |
| 2012 | CenturyLink Center | 30,000 to 40,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $121,950 | Euro crisis, US downgrade |
| 2011 | Qwest Center | about 40,000 press | $124,750 | QE2, Japan quake |
| 2010 | Qwest Center | 30,000 to 40,000 (estimate) estimate by Tilman Versch | $115,325 | Slow recovery |
| 2009 | Qwest Center | about 35,000 Buffett letter | $92,005 | Financial crisis |
| 2008 | Qwest Center | about 31,000 Buffett letter | $133,600 | Bear Stearns rescue |
| 2007 | Qwest Center | about 27,000 Buffett letter | $109,250 | Housing peak |
| 2006 | Qwest Center | about 24,000 Buffett letter | $88,710 | Hurricane Katrina |
| 2005 | Qwest Center | about 21,000 Buffett letter | $84,350 | Fed hikes, insurance probes |
| 2004 | Qwest Center | about 19,500 Buffett at the meeting | $93,390 | Recovery, 1% rates |
| 2003 | Omaha Civic Auditorium | no reliable number | $70,400 | Bear market, Iraq war |
| 2002 | Omaha Civic Auditorium | about 10,000 rough press estimate | $74,300 | 9/11 and Enron |
| 2001 | Omaha Civic Auditorium | no reliable number | $67,005 | Dot-com bust |
| 2000 | Omaha Civic Auditorium | about 13,000 press | $59,300 | Dot-com peak |
| 1999 | Aksarben Coliseum | about 15,000 press | $75,600 | LTCM, internet boom |
| 1998 | Aksarben Coliseum | more than 10,000 Buffett letter | $69,100 | Asian crisis |
| 1997 | Aksarben Coliseum | about 7,500 Buffett letter | $39,000 | Irrational exuberance |
| 1996 | Holiday Convention Centre | about 5,000 Buffett letter | $33,800 | Fed cuts, GEICO deal |
| 1995 | Holiday Convention Centre | about 4,000 Buffett letter | $22,200 | Rate shock, peso crisis |
| 1994 | Orpheum Theater | more than 2,750 Buffett letter | $15,450 | Fed starts hiking |
People: Buffett’s own numbers from his letters or the meeting where they exist, otherwise named press reports. Berkshire does not publish an official count. BRK.A: the close on the meeting day, or for Saturday meetings the close on the Friday before. Market backdrop: the market news in the months before the meeting.
Where was the meeting before 1994?
Our transcripts start in 1994. Before that, the meeting was small. In the 1970s it took place in the employee cafeteria of National Indemnity in Omaha, a company Berkshire had bought a few years earlier. In the early 1980s it moved to the Red Lion Hotel, then to the Joslyn Art Museum, and around 1990 to the Orpheum Theater, where our table begins.
Sources for the years before 1994: Omaha World-Herald and Max Olson’s Berkshire archive. These dates are less certain than the table above.
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How many questions did shareholders ask at each meeting?
TL;DR: Between 27 and 92 per meeting from 1994 to 2023, and 1,803 in total. The bars link to each transcript.
* Our 2026 page is a shorter transcript. It numbers only 5 audience questions, so the bar is lighter. 2024 and 2025 count the questions in our transcripts of those years.
The busiest Q&A was in 1998 with 92 questions. The fewest were in 2022 with 27.
- From the floor: 1,241 questions from shareholders at the microphones in the hall.
- By email: 336 questions that shareholders sent in and journalists read out, from 2009 on.
- From the analyst panel: 144 questions from the analyst panel on stage, 2012 to 2019.
- Journalists and proposals: 7 questions the journalists asked themselves, and 3 shareholder proposals presented in the online meetings of 2020 and 2021.
- Named askers: 1,576 of 1,731 questions (91%) say who asked. Askers came from at least 35 countries.
Who asked questions most often?
- Whitney Tilson, hedge fund manager and value investing writer from New York City: 9 meetings (2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2017)
- Glenn Tongue, value investor in New York and co-founder of T2 Partners: 6 meetings (2005, 2007, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2022)
- Frank Martin, founder of Martin Capital Management in Elkhart, Indiana: 4 meetings (1995, 2006, 2007, 2008)
- Bill Ackman, founder of Pershing Square Capital Management: 3 meetings (1994, 1998, 2005)
- Peter Bevelin, Swedish investor and author of Seeking Wisdom: 3 meetings (1994, 1995, 1996)
On the analyst panel, these people asked the most:
- Jonathan Brandt: 42 questions from the panel (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019)
- Gregg Warren: 36 questions from the panel (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019)
- Jay Gelb: 24 questions from the panel (2012, 2014, 2017, 2019)
- Cliff Gallant: 18 questions from the panel (2012, 2013, 2016)
- Gary Ransom: 18 questions from the panel (2012, 2015, 2018)
- Doug Kass: 6 questions from the panel (2013)
We list only people we could identify with confidence from the meeting (how they introduced themselves, their home town) and from public sources. Many shareholders came back year after year without a public role. We leave them out.
Who asks the questions? Women at the Berkshire meeting
TL;DR: About one question in ten comes from a woman: 10.4% since 1994. At the microphones the share has gone up since about 2014. In the emailed questions it has not.
We looked at who asked each question: the shareholder at the microphone or the person who sent the email. Of 1,399 questions where we could tell, 146 came from a woman. That is 10.4%. For thirty years the share stayed between 8% and 12% in every decade.
42 of 358 questions
At the microphone: 11.7%. No emailed questions yet.
39 of 460 questions
At the microphone: 8.1%. By email: 16.7%.
44 of 387 questions
At the microphone: 14.3%. By email: 5.9%.
21 of 194 questions
At the microphone: 24.6%. By email: 5.1%.
How did the share change from year to year?
The share moves a lot from year to year, because a meeting has only 30 to 80 questions. The lowest years were 2003 (1 of 41) and 2013 (1 of 37). The highest was 2018 with 7 of 34.
Share of questions asked by women, among the questions where we could tell. Each bar opens the transcript of that year. 2026 is left out: our transcript of it has only 5 questions.
Do women ask more at the microphone or by email?
At the microphone. Women asked 11.6% of the questions at the microphones and 6.2% of the emailed questions. From 1994 to 2013 women asked 10% of the microphone questions. From 2014 to 2025 it was 18% (35 of 191). The emailed questions stayed at about 5% since 2020. In 2020 and 2021 nearly every question came by email, so the overall share fell in those years.
| Meetings | All askers | At the microphone | By email |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 to 1999 | 11.7% (42 of 358) | 11.7% (42 of 358) | no emails yet |
| 2000 to 2009 | 8.5% (39 of 460) | 8.1% (36 of 442) | 16.7% (3 of 18) |
| 2010 to 2019 | 11.4% (44 of 387) | 14.3% (36 of 251) | 5.9% (8 of 136) |
| 2020 to 2026 | 10.8% (21 of 194) | 24.6% (14 of 57) | 5.1% (7 of 137) |
| All | 10.4% (146 of 1399) | 11.6% (128 of 1108) | 6.2% (18 of 291) |
Emailed questions started in 2009. The 2000 to 2009 email share rests on 2009 only (3 of 18).
Which women stand out?
- Peg Gallagher, 1994: the first woman in our transcripts. She asked the 12th question of the 1994 meeting. Our archive starts in 1994.
- Susan Tilson, 2013: the only woman at a microphone that year. Her question was about women in leadership.
- 2025: 4 of the 10 microphone questions came from women. That is 40%, but on a small number.
How we counted: we estimated each asker’s gender from the first name and from cues in the transcript, such as “she writes” or “my husband”. This is an estimate, not what people said about themselves. We count only the people who asked: shareholders at the microphones and the people who sent emailed questions. Analysts and journalists who asked their own questions are left out, and so are the journalists who read the emails aloud. For 253 questions we could not tell. They could move the share by a few points, but not the pattern.
How international is the Berkshire meeting?
TL;DR: About 10% of the questions came from outside the US in the 1990s and 36% since 2020. The askers came from 41 countries. Canada and Germany lead.
We looked up where each person at the microphone or in the email questions said they live. We could place 1,367 of the questions from 1994 to 2025. Analysts and journalists on the panels are not counted. 2026 is left out because our transcript of it is shorter.
How many questions come from outside the US?
In the 1990s about one question in ten came from outside the US. Since 2020 it is more than one in three. In 2019 it passed half for the first time: 52%.
| Meetings | Questions with a known country | From outside the US | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 to 1999 | 385 | 37 | 10% |
| 2000 to 2009 | 480 | 91 | 19% |
| 2010 to 2019 | 361 | 87 | 24% |
| 2020 to 2025 | 141 | 51 | 36% |
| All | 1,367 | 266 | 19% |
Which countries ask the most questions?
After the US with 1,101 questions, Canada and Germany asked the most. Germany, Austria and Switzerland together asked 62 questions. The first question from Germany came in 2000.
Green: Germany. Light green: Austria and Switzerland. “Since” is the year of the first question from that country.
Where do the askers live?
The askers came from 41 countries. Each circle sits at the average location of the askers from that country, so the spots are approximate. A bigger circle means more questions.
- United States: 1,101 questions.
- Europe: 103 questions from 14 countries. Germany 50, United Kingdom 25, Austria 6, Switzerland 6, Sweden 4, Ireland 3, Italy 2, Belarus 1, Belgium 1, Greece 1, Norway 1, Portugal 1, Spain 1, Ukraine 1.
- Asia-Pacific: 88 questions from 12 countries. China 27, Australia 21, Hong Kong 9, India 8, Singapore 6, Japan 4, Taiwan 4, Malaysia 3, New Zealand 2, Philippines 2, Macau 1, Mongolia 1.
- Canada: 51 questions.
- Rest of the world: 24 questions from 13 countries. Israel 5, Mexico 4, Panama 3, Brazil 2, South Africa 2, Eswatini 1, Guatemala 1, Kenya 1, Kuwait 1, Saudi Arabia 1, Trinidad and Tobago 1, US Virgin Islands 1, Venezuela 1.
When did each country ask its first question?
Three countries asked questions in 1994: the US, Canada and Sweden. By 2025 it was 41.
| Meeting | First question from | Countries so far |
|---|---|---|
| 1994 | United States, Canada, Sweden | 3 |
| 1995 | Singapore, Saudi Arabia | 5 |
| 1996 | United Kingdom, Switzerland, Portugal, US Virgin Islands | 9 |
| 1997 | Australia | 10 |
| 1999 | Ireland | 11 |
| 2000 | Germany, Hong Kong | 13 |
| 2001 | China, Japan, Belarus | 16 |
| 2002 | South Africa | 17 |
| 2003 | India, Austria | 19 |
| 2004 | Mexico, Greece, Trinidad and Tobago | 22 |
| 2006 | Brazil, Norway | 24 |
| 2007 | Kuwait | 25 |
| 2009 | Philippines | 26 |
| 2010 | Israel, New Zealand | 28 |
| 2013 | Kenya, Macau | 30 |
| 2014 | Taiwan, Italy, Eswatini | 33 |
| 2015 | Venezuela | 34 |
| 2018 | Ukraine | 35 |
| 2019 | Panama, Belgium | 37 |
| 2023 | Malaysia | 38 |
| 2024 | Spain | 39 |
| 2025 | Guatemala, Mongolia | 41 |
Who owns Berkshire Hathaway?
TL;DR: Between one and two million people own Berkshire. About 40,000 come to Omaha. About 55 get to ask a question.
Berkshire has one meeting a year and a very large group of owners. Here is how that group gets smaller, from everyone who owns a share to the few people who stand at a microphone.
Why does nobody know the exact number of owners?
Most people hold Berkshire through a broker. Their shares sit in the broker’s name, so Berkshire never sees them. That is why three honest numbers are so far apart.
Source: Berkshire 10-K for 2025, Item 5.
Source: our 2019 meeting transcript.
Source: our 2022 meeting transcript.
Counted in our transcripts 1994 to 2026.
See the world map in the section above.
How we got these numbers: 40,000 is the crowd size Buffett named in his letters and at the 2025 meeting. Attendance is an estimate; Berkshire does not publish a count. The questions per meeting are our own count, 1,803 questions over 33 meetings.
Who brought the Berkshire meeting to the world?
TL;DR: Nobody streamed the meeting until 2016. Yahoo Finance streamed it from 2016 to 2021. CNBC has since 2022. Journalists joined the Q&A in 2009, analysts in 2012.
For 22 years, you had to be in Omaha to see the meeting. Berkshire filmed it, but nobody else could. Visitors and press were not allowed to record. Then the meeting got too big for the arena.
In his letter for 2015, Buffett wrote: “Charlie and I have finally decided to enter the 21st Century.” Two reasons: the arena was full with more than 40,000 people, and shareholders could check that he and Munger were still fit.
What changed, year by year?
- 1998: 46 media outlets came to the meeting, 13 of them from outside the US. It is the only media count in Buffett’s letters.
- 2004: Buffett said from the stage that no one may film the meeting. Anyone who does has to leave.
- 2009: Three journalists join the Q&A: Carol Loomis (Fortune), Becky Quick (CNBC) and Andrew Ross Sorkin (The New York Times). They read questions that shareholders send in by email.
- 2012: Three analysts join them on stage. In 2013 one of the seats went to a short seller, Doug Kass. The analyst panel ran until 2019.
- 2016: The first livestream, on Yahoo Finance, with a Mandarin translation.
- 2018: CNBC opens its Warren Buffett Archive with video of every meeting since 1994.
- 2020 and 2021: Online meetings. In 2020 Buffett spoke in an empty arena in Omaha, and Becky Quick picked the questions from her home in New Jersey. In 2021 the meeting came from Los Angeles.
- 2022: CNBC takes over, on TV and as a stream. Becky Quick reads email questions in turns with shareholders in the hall.
- 2026: Greg Abel’s first meeting as CEO, the fifth year in a row on CNBC.
How many people watched the stream?
| Meeting | Published audience | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 1.1 million unique live visits and 11.5 million replays | Berkshire letter for 2016 |
| 2017 | 1.43 million unique viewers and 3.1 million live views on Yahoo, plus 3.9 million live views through partners in China; 17.1 million replays | Berkshire letter for 2017, Yahoo Finance |
| 2018 | “35 million people”, a Yahoo claim with no method given | MediaPost |
| 2019 to 2026 | No numbers published by Yahoo or CNBC | None found |
Sources: Berkshire shareholder letters (1998, 2015, 2016, 2017), our meeting transcripts 2004 to 2025, CNBC on the Buffett Archive, CNBC on the 2026 stream and the Berkshire visitor guide 2024. Viewer numbers as published.
Where can I learn more about the Berkshire meeting?
TL;DR: Videos, books and archives we use ourselves, plus where to find shareholder stories.
- Our transcripts: full transcripts of every Berkshire meeting since 1994, with chapters and timestamps.
- CNBC Warren Buffett Archive: video of every annual meeting since 1994, interviews and documentaries, including Becky Quick’s Warren Buffett: Investor, Teacher, Icon.
- Buffett & Munger Unscripted: Alex Morris sorts the meeting answers since 1994 by topic. The book (affiliate link) and our interview with Alex Morris.
- The Warren Buffett Shareholder: Lawrence A. Cunningham collects stories from 43 longtime meeting visitors. The book (affiliate link).
- Berkshire Hathaway Archive: Max Olson’s searchable archive of all letters since 1965 and meeting transcripts since 1994.
- More books: our list of Berkshire Hathaway books and AGM resources.
- Omaha local news: KETV and WOWT talk to shareholders every year, on KETV’s YouTube channel and WOWT’s YouTube channel.
Who made this page?
Tilman Versch, founder of Good Investing. He first went to Omaha in 2019, has been back more than ten times and has spent more than 1,000 hours researching the meeting.
What do readers ask about the history of the Berkshire meeting?
TL;DR: Short answers on the crowd size and where to read what was said.
How many people go to the Berkshire meeting?
Nobody knows the exact number. Berkshire does not publish one. Buffett gave his own estimate in many letters: more than 10,000 in 1998, about 31,000 in 2008 and more than 40,000 in 2015. Since 2017 there are only press estimates of around 40,000, and fewer people came in 2026. The arena seats about 18,000; the rest watch from overflow rooms.
Where can I read what was said at each meeting?
In our Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting transcripts. Every meeting since 1994 has a full transcript with chapters, a short summary and timestamps that open the video at the right second.
Get the free Berkshire meeting guide newsletter: dates, tickets, travel tips and what to expect at the next meeting. Or read the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting guide now.
How this page was made: dates and venues come from the proxy statements Berkshire filed with the SEC. Attendance comes from Buffett’s letters and named press reports. BRK.A prices show only the price at each meeting. The market backdrop names the news before each meeting (sources: Federal Reserve History, the FDIC and Berkshire’s letters). Questions and countries are our own count from our transcripts. This page is for learning only and is no investment advice.