Amazon is preparing another sweeping round of corporate layoffs, with thousands of white-collar roles expected to be eliminated as soon as next week, according to people briefed on the plans. The cuts will deepen a restructuring that has already erased tens of thousands of office jobs and will push the company toward what insiders describe as its largest corporate workforce reduction to date.
The new reductions will hit key business units and central functions, sharpening a pivot toward leaner management and heavier use of automation and artificial intelligence. For employees in Seattle and other hubs, the move signals that the era of unrestrained corporate expansion at Amazon is firmly over.
Another wave of cuts across Amazon’s core businesses
People familiar with the planning say the company is readying thousands of additional corporate job cuts that will land across its cloud, retail and people operations. Internal discussions indicate that Packages of notifications are being prepared for staff in Amazon Web Services, the consumer retail organization and human resources, with managers instructed to finalize lists ahead of next week. One person described the process as highly centralized, with only a small circle of leaders, including those reporting up to CEO Andy Jassy, fully briefed on the final scope.
The latest restructuring follows earlier guidance that Amazon would streamline overlapping teams and reduce layers of management. People briefed on the plans say the new cuts are designed to accelerate that effort, particularly in AWS, where leadership has been under pressure to protect margins while investing heavily in generative AI infrastructure. One source described the internal message as blunt: the company wants fewer decision makers and faster execution in its biggest money-making units.
From 14,000 to 30,000: the scale of the corporate reset
The coming layoffs build on a restructuring that has already removed tens of thousands of office jobs. Earlier this cycle, Amazon eliminated 14,000 corporate roles, a move that hit recruiting, devices and some back-office teams particularly hard. People close to the company say that round was framed internally as a reset after years of over-hiring during the pandemic boom, when leadership staffed up aggressively to chase e-commerce and cloud demand that has since normalized.
Now, internal projections suggest the total corporate reduction could reach 30,000 jobs by the time the latest cuts are complete, which would amount to nearly 10% of the company’s office workforce. One social media post that has circulated widely among staff described 30,000 as “nearly 30,000 jobs by May 2026,” underscoring the sense among employees that the retrenchment is not a short, sharp shock but a drawn-out reset of the corporate cost base.
Inside Jassy’s rationale: culture over crisis
Publicly, CEO Andy Jassy has insisted that the restructuring is not a sign of distress but a deliberate cultural shift. In a recent earnings call, Jassy told analysts the changes were “not really financially driven and it’s not even really AI driven,” but instead about returning to a faster, more entrepreneurial way of working. People who have spoken with senior leaders say that message has been repeated internally, with an emphasis on trimming bureaucracy and empowering smaller teams.
At the same time, the pattern of cuts suggests a clear link to automation and generative AI, even if executives play down that connection. Earlier reductions were described in internal documents as tied to AI, particularly in functions like customer support, marketing operations and some finance roles where new tools can automate routine analysis. People close to the planning say the latest wave will again target areas where generative systems can replace or augment human decision making, even as leadership continues to frame the changes as a cultural clean-up rather than a technology shock.
How the cuts will hit teams and tech hubs
For employees, the most immediate question is who will be affected and where. Internal briefings suggest that AWS will again see significant changes, with some product and sales support roles consolidated as the cloud unit focuses on large-scale AI infrastructure and data center investments. Retail teams that manage categories, pricing and logistics planning are also bracing for deeper cuts, as leadership pushes more of that work into centralized tools and algorithms.
In Seattle, where People crowd the Amazon Spheres at lunchtime, the layoffs are expected to ripple through the city’s tech-heavy downtown. Local business leaders note that the new cuts will extend what is already one of the largest rounds of Sweeping Amazon job cuts in the company’s history, with knock-on effects for housing, small businesses and the broader Pacific Northwest tech ecosystem.
Signals from markets, rivals and the rumor mill
Investors have largely welcomed the drive to cut costs, even as employees brace for more uncertainty. After reports that Amazon is preparing to lay off several thousand more corporate workers to “streamline operations,” people close to the stock say they expect further gains if the company can show sustained margin improvement. One financial summary noted that the projected 30,000 job reduction had already nudged shares higher in after-hours trade, a sign that Wall Street is firmly on the side of aggressive restructuring.
Outside the company, speculation about the scale and timing of the cuts has been intense. One widely shared post suggested 16,000 employees could be affected in the next phase alone, while another described Driven efforts to cut nearly 30,000 jobs as part of a push toward generative AI, logistics automation and expanded AWS data centers. Tech forums have amplified those numbers, with one discussion thread noting that They could start as soon as next week and that “thousands” of employees were already bracing for impact.
