GWW Historical PE Ratio Notes

— W.W. Grainger, Inc. (ticker symbol GWW) is a leading broad-line supplier of maintenance, repair, & operating (MRO) products and services to businesses & institutions in North America, Japan, and Europe. The company distributes over two million products, ranging from safety & janitorial supplies to electrical, plumbing, & material handling equipment. Grainger operates through multiple channels, including high-touch sales & an increasingly significant digital platform, enabling efficient procurement for customers in industries such as manufacturing, government, healthcare, & commercial sectors. When assessing Grainger's historical price-to-earnings (PE) ratio, it’s important to consider how the company's stable demand—driven by businesses' ongoing MRO needs—even during economic downturns, has contributed to generally resilient earnings. This perceived reliability often leads to a market premium, reflected in higher PE ratios during periods of economic uncertainty or when digital transformation fuels revenue growth. Conversely, macroeconomic slowdowns or supply chain disruptions can pressure earnings, impacting the ratio. As you review GWW’s historical PE data, bear in mind how its role as a critical B2B supplier, innovation in e-commerce, & end-market diversification influence market sentiment & valuation over time.

On this page we presented the W.W. Grainger Historical PE Ratio information for W.W. Grainger' stock. The average GWW historical PE based on using the annualized quarterly earnings result at each measurement period (for the "E" in the PE calculation; and the closing price on earnings date as the "P") is 21.0. Meanwhile, using the trailing twelve month (TTM) quarterly earnings result as our method of calculation the "E" value at each measurement period, the average GWW historical PE based on this TTM earnings result method is 21.8.

Let's now compare this GWW historical PE result, against the recent PE: when this page was posted on 10/15/2026, the most recent closing price for GWW had been 1331.17, and the most recent quarterly earnings result, annualized, was 48.04. Meanwhile, the most recent TTM earnings summed to 43.31. From these numbers, we calculate the recent GWW PE on 10/15/2026 based on annualized quarterly EPS was 27.7. Based on GWW's history, that recent PE is elevated relative to the historical average, with the recent PE 31.9% higher than the historical average PE across our data set for W.W. Grainger. Looking at the recent GWW PE on 10/15/2026 based on TTM EPS, we calculate the ratio at 30.7. Based on GWW's history, that recent PE is elevated relative to the historical average, with the recent PE 40.8% higher than the historical average PE across our W.W. Grainger data set with TTM EPS used in the calculation at each period.

Another interesting GWW historical PE Ratio calculation we look at is to take the median earnings per share of the last four quarters for GWW, and then annualize the resulting value... with that annualized number then being used in the PE calculation. To walk through this math for GWW, we start with the past four EPS numbers and we first sort them from lowest to highest: 9.44, 10.21, 11.65, and 12.01. We then toss out the highest and lowest result, and then take the average of those two middle numbers — 10.21 and 11.65 — which gives us the median of 10.93. Basically the way to think about this 10.93 number is this: for the trailing four earnings reports, 10.93 marks the "middle ground" number where GWW has reported a value higher than 10.93 half the time, and has reported a value lower than 10.93 half the time. Annualizing that median value then gets us to 43.72/share, which we use as the denominator in our next PE calculation. With 1331.17 as the numerator (as of 10/15/2026), the calculation is then 1331.17 / 43.72 = 30.4 as the GWW PE ratio as of 10/15/2026, based on that annualized median value we calculated.

For self directed investors doing their due diligence on GWW or any other given stock, valuation analysis for GWW can greatly benefit from studying the past earnings and resulting PE calculations. This exercise can help inform an analysis as to whether the past earnings trajectory and current versus historical PE ratios justify the current stock value.

That's why we bring you HistoricalPERatio.com to make it easy for investors to investigate W.W. Grainger PE history or the past PE information for any stock in our coverage universe. And in your continued research we hope you will be sure to check out the further links included for earnings surprises history (beat/miss data) as well as next earnings dates for GWW. Thanks for visiting, and the next time you need to research GWW Historical PE Ratio or the ratio for another stock, we hope you'll think of our site, as your go-to historical PE ratio research resource of choice.