Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) is implementing the largest reduction of its corporate workforce in the company’s history, according to reports from CNBC and Reuters. While Amazon’s internal announcement confirmed an overall reduction of approximately 14,000 corporate roles , external reports suggest the cuts could total as many as 30,000 positions.
The company was expected to begin notifying impacted employees via email on Tuesday morning. The layoffs are described as “sweeping,” spanning almost every business division , with specific reports mentioning human resources (known as People Experience and Technology or PXT), operations, devices and services, and Amazon Web Services (AWS).
In an internal memo posted on October 28, Beth Galetti, Senior Vice President of People Experience and Technology, characterized the cuts as a “continuation” of ongoing organizational work. The stated goal is to “get even stronger by further reducing bureaucracy, removing layers, and shifting resources”.
Galetti noted that the current generation of AI is the “most transformative technology we’ve seen since the Internet,” requiring the company to be “organized more leanly… to move as quickly as possible”.
The reductions are part of a broader cost-cutting campaign by CEO Andy Jassy that began in 2022. Jassy has focused on simplifying Amazon’s corporate structure. He previously stated in June that increased use of generative AI would likely lead to further job cuts, reducing the total corporate workforce.
An analyst from eMarketer suggested the move signals that Amazon is “realizing enough AI-driven productivity gains… to support a substantial reduction in force”. Additionally, Reuters reported that a five-day-per-week return-to-office mandate had “failed to generate sufficient attrition,” cited as another reason for the size of the layoff.
Amazon stated it will offer most impacted employees 90 days to find a new role within the company. For employees who cannot find a new role or opt to leave, Amazon will provide transition support, including severance pay, health insurance benefits, and outplacement services.
The potential 30,000 job cuts would represent nearly 10% of Amazon’s approximately 350,000 corporate employees. Amazon is the second-largest private employer in the US, with a total global workforce exceeding 1.54 million, most of whom are in its warehouse operations. The company has already reduced its workforce by over 27,000 employees since 2022.
This round of cuts would be the largest in the tech industry since at least 2020. According to data from Layoffs.fyi, a site that tracks job reductions, 216 tech companies have cut approximately 98,000 jobs so far in 2025. This follows a peak in 2023, when tech companies eliminated over 260,000 jobs. Other firms have also reduced staff this year, including Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) (22,000), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) (15,000), and Meta (NASDAQ: META). Salesforce (NYSE: CRM) CEO Marc Benioff also pointed to AI adoption as a catalyst for 4,000 layoffs in customer support.
The layoffs were announced even as the company produces “strong business results”. However, Amazon’s primary profit center, AWS, reported 17.5% second-quarter sales growth, which was below the gains of competitors Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) Azure (39%) and Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) Cloud (32%). AWS also recently suffered a 15-hour outage that affected services like Snapchat (NYSE: SNAP) and Venmo. Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) shares rose 1.2% on Monday, with the company scheduled to report third-quarter earnings on Thursday.
Headline photo: Amazon campus. Photo courtesy of Amazon.com
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