What is a 10-K Filing?

A 10-K is the annual report that every publicly traded company in the United States must file with the SEC. It contains audited financial statements, a detailed description of the business, a comprehensive list of risk factors, and management’s discussion of the year’s performance. The 10-K is the single most comprehensive financial document a company publishes.

Unlike glossy investor presentations or press releases, a 10-K is a legal document. Management can spin things in an earnings call, but lying in a 10-K is securities fraud—a federal crime. The financial statements must be verified by an independent accounting firm. Every material risk must be disclosed. That accountability is what makes the 10-K the authoritative source for understanding a public company.

For background on the broader SEC reporting system, see what is an SEC filing.

10-K vs 10-Q: what’s the difference?

The 10-K and 10-Q are the two main recurring filings that public companies produce. The 10-K covers the full fiscal year; the 10-Q covers individual quarters.

	10-K	10-Q
Frequency	Annual (once per year)	Quarterly (3x per year, Q1–Q3)
Coverage period	Full fiscal year	One fiscal quarter
Financial statements	Fully audited	Reviewed, not audited
Length	50–200+ pages	20–80 pages
Business description	Full (Item 1)	References 10-K; updates only
Risk factors	Full (Item 1A)	Material changes only
Due date (large filer)	60 days after fiscal year end	40 days after quarter end

The key distinction is auditing. A 10-K contains fully audited financial statements—an independent accounting firm has examined the numbers and certified their accuracy. A 10-Q contains reviewed statements, which is a lighter process. This is why the 10-K is the authoritative source for annual results and the 10-Q is treated as a more informal update.

Note that there is no Q4 10-Q. The fourth quarter is covered in the annual 10-K, so companies file three 10-Qs per year (for Q1, Q2, and Q3) and one 10-K.

What’s inside a 10-K filing?

The 10-K follows a standardized structure set by the SEC. Every company uses the same item numbers, which makes it possible to navigate across companies once you know the layout.

Item 1: Business

This section describes what the company does—its products and services, how it makes money, the markets it operates in, its competitive position, and its strategy. For a diversified company like Apple, this section breaks down each business segment (iPhone, Mac, iPad, Wearables, Services) and the competitive dynamics in each. This is where you build your foundational understanding of the company before looking at the numbers.

Item 1A: Risk Factors

Companies must disclose any factor that could materially harm the business or its stock price. This section is often long and can read as legal boilerplate, but it rewards careful reading—especially the year-over-year changes. A risk factor that appears for the first time, or a change in how an existing risk is described, can be an early signal of something management is genuinely worried about. NVIDIA CORP (NVDA) uses this section to detail semiconductor supply chain risks, export controls, and competition from custom AI chips developed by major customers.

Item 2: Properties

A description of the company’s significant physical locations—headquarters, manufacturing plants, data centers, offices, retail stores. This section is usually brief and less critical for most investors, but it can be relevant for capital-intensive businesses or real estate analysis.

Item 7: Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A)

The MD&A is the most readable part of a 10-K. This is where management explains the year’s results in plain English: what drove revenue growth (or decline), how margins changed, what the company invested in, and what they’re watching going forward. It’s required to compare the current year to the prior year, which makes it easy to identify trends. Most experienced investors read the MD&A before diving into the financial statements.

Item 8: Financial Statements

This section contains the core financial data, audited by an independent accounting firm:

• Income statement (also called the statement of operations): revenue, cost of goods sold, gross profit, operating expenses, operating income, net income. This is where you see profitability.
• Balance sheet: assets (what the company owns), liabilities (what it owes), and shareholders’ equity (the difference). This is where you assess financial strength and leverage.
• Cash flow statement: operating cash flow, investing cash flow, and financing cash flow. Operating cash flow is often considered more reliable than net income because it’s harder to manipulate with accounting choices.
• Notes to the financial statements: detailed explanations of accounting policies, segment breakdowns, debt terms, lease obligations, stock-based compensation, and dozens of other items. The notes are dense but contain important details that the headline numbers don’t capture.

Item 9A: Controls and Procedures

This section contains certifications required under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. The CEO and CFO must personally certify that the financial statements are accurate and that the company has adequate internal controls over financial reporting. External auditors also issue an opinion on internal controls for large accelerated filers. A material weakness disclosed here is a significant red flag.

How to read a 10-K filing efficiently

A typical 10-K runs 80–150 pages. You don’t need to read every word. Here’s an efficient approach:

Start with Item 1 (Business). Before you can evaluate the numbers, you need to understand what the company actually does. Read the business description to build a mental model of how the company makes money.

Read Item 1A (Risk Factors). These reveal what management—and their lawyers—believe could go wrong. Don’t just skim the list; note whether any risks are new compared to last year’s 10-K and whether the language on existing risks has changed.

Jump to Item 7 (MD&A). Management’s discussion is the plain-English explanation of the year’s results. Read this before you look at the financial statements—it provides the narrative context for the numbers.

Check Item 8 (Financial Statements). Focus on the income statement for revenue and profitability trends, the balance sheet for debt and liquidity, and the cash flow statement for operating cash generation. Compare to the prior year’s figures, which are presented side-by-side.

Compare to the prior year’s 10-K. Year-over-year comparison within a single filing is useful, but reading last year’s 10-K alongside this year’s reveals multi-year trends and shows whether management’s prior outlook proved accurate.

For a more detailed section-by-section walkthrough, see how to read a 10-K filing.

When are 10-K filings due?

The SEC groups companies into categories based on the market value of their publicly held shares (the “public float”). Larger companies face tighter deadlines.

Filer Category	Definition	10-K Due Date
Large accelerated filer	Public float ≥ $700M	60 days after fiscal year end
Accelerated filer	Public float $75M–$700M	75 days after fiscal year end
Non-accelerated filer	Public float < $75M	90 days after fiscal year end
Smaller reporting company	Revenue < $250M or float < $700M	90 days after fiscal year end

Most S&P 500 companies have December 31 fiscal year ends, making February and March the busiest period for 10-K filings. Companies with non-calendar fiscal years file on a different schedule—Apple’s fiscal year ends in late September, so its 10-K typically arrives in late October or early November.

Companies that need more time can file a Form 12b-25 (“NT 10-K”) before the deadline, which grants a 15-day extension. Extensions beyond that require SEC approval and can raise investor concern.

Real example: reading a 10-K summary

Reading a 200-page 10-K from scratch is daunting. AI-powered summaries can significantly reduce the time required.

To see what a 10-K summary looks like in practice, check out AssetRoom’s summary of NVIDIA’s latest annual report or Palantir’s latest 10-K. These summaries extract the key highlights from the filing—revenue drivers, margin changes, major risk factors, management’s outlook—in a format you can read in minutes rather than hours. Snowflake’s filings are another good example if you’re tracking high-growth software businesses.

How to get 10-K filing alerts

When a company you follow files its 10-K, you can be notified automatically rather than checking EDGAR manually.

AssetRoom sends free email alerts with AI-powered summaries when a company files a new 10-K. You get the key points delivered to your inbox instead of having to find and read the filing yourself. See our guide to SEC filing alerts for setup instructions.

EDGAR email notifications are available directly from the SEC at sec.gov. You can subscribe to receive an email whenever a specific company files any document or a specific form type.

RSS feeds through EDGAR allow programmatic access to new filings as they appear.

For a comparison of tools that summarize and deliver 10-K filings, see best SEC filing summary tools.

Where to find 10-K filings

The SEC publishes all 10-K filings on EDGAR, its free public database. You can search by company name or ticker and access filings going back decades.

Most company investor relations pages also link directly to their most recent 10-K, often in a more readable HTML format than the raw EDGAR version.

AssetRoom provides AI-powered summaries of 10-K filings so you can get the key points without reading 100+ pages, with direct links to the original SEC filing if you want to verify anything or read further.