Massive layoffs announced at Meta. Almost 8,000 employees, targeted by the first wave of restructuring
meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, will begin on May 20 a new restructuring plan through which it will lay off approximately 10% of its staff, i.e. nearly 8,000 employees, according to Reuters.
This is the first phase, with further cuts scheduled for the second half of the year, said three sources familiar with the company's plans. Plans could be adjusted depending on the evolution of artificial intelligence technologies.
Meta representatives declined to comment officially on the timing or extent of the layoffs. Reuters reported last month that Meta is considering cutting more than 20% of its total global workforce.
Other companies have already made similar cuts. Amazon cut about 30,000 jobs and fintech company Block cut almost half of its workforce in February. In both cases, the decisions were justified by increasing efficiency through artificial intelligence.
The platform Layoffs.fyi, which monitors the labor market in technology, indicates that more than 73,000 employees in this sector have lost their jobs during the current year. This figure follows a year 2024 in which total layoffs reached approximately 153,000.
The new staff cuts are the biggest for Meta since the 2022–2023 restructuring, when 21,000 employees were axed. The company is making these changes from a strong financial position, having in 2025 generated revenues of more than 200 billion dollars and a profit of 60 billion.
At the end of last year, the Menlo Park, California-based company had nearly 79,000 employees.
In recent weeks, Meta has reorganized the teams in the Reality Labs division. Engineers from different departments were transferred to a new structure called “Applied AI”. Its goal is to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence agents capable of writing code and performing complex tasks autonomously.
Some of the employees are also to be moved to the new Meta Small Business division, created last month as part of the internal reorganization process.
