What just happened? Meta plans to cut about 10% of its workforce, or roughly 8,000 employees, and will no longer fill 6,000 open roles, according to an internal memo sent Thursday. The layoffs are set to take effect May 20 as the company redirects resources toward AI, including large language models and supporting infrastructure.
The move reflects a broader pattern across major technology companies, where AI spending is rising even as headcount declines. Meta has projected record capital expenditures this year and announced several multibillion-dollar AI partnerships in recent months. Internally, employees have been encouraged to use AI agents in day-to-day work, including software engineering and content generation, as the company looks to increase output per worker.
In the memo, Chief People Officer Janelle Gale framed the layoffs as part of a broader reallocation of resources toward those initiatives. "We're doing this as part of our continued effort to run the company more efficiently and to allow us to offset the other investments we're making," she wrote.
Meta's AI push is driving higher costs across compute and hiring, two areas that have become more expensive across the industry. Training and deploying large-scale models requires major investment in data centers, GPUs, and energy infrastructure, while competition for experienced AI researchers and engineers remains intense. Those pressures are pushing companies to cut expenses elsewhere, often through hiring freezes or layoffs.
The company had nearly 79,000 employees at the beginning of the year. Earlier rounds of cuts affected divisions including Reality Labs, as Meta shifted focus away from parts of its metaverse strategy and toward AI-driven products. The latest cuts extend that restructuring across more of the business.
Gale acknowledged the uncertainty created internally by the announcement, noting that details were shared earlier than planned after reports of the cuts surfaced publicly. "I know this is unwelcome news and confirming this puts everyone in an uneasy state, but we feel this is the best path forward, given the circumstances," she wrote.
The memo also outlined severance and transition support, including 16 weeks of base pay for US employees, additional compensation based on tenure, extended healthcare coverage, and career placement services. Notifications will be sent by email on May 20 to affected employees.
Other large tech companies are making similar moves. Just this week, Microsoft started offering voluntary retirement packages for the first time to thousands of US workers, reflecting similar cost adjustments tied to rising AI spending.
Meta is positioning these changes as a way to balance costs with its AI investments. The company is scheduled to report first-quarter earnings next week, which may offer further insight into how those tradeoffs are reshaping its financial outlook and product roadmap.