Tech A 2026 timeline

26/07 07:15 - Tech A 2026 timeline
Among a range of factors leading to a wave of tech sector layoffs in 2026 is the rapid rise of artificial intelligence and automation. Companies are reconfiguring their workforces to leverage AI for increased efficiency and reduced operating costs. This realignment and reduction is implemented even by companies reporting strong financial performance. But it’s not just AI leading to workforce cuts. Complementing this technological shift are ongoing economic uncertainty, inflation, and higher interest rates, compounded by a chip shortage and rising energy costs. This mix is driving companies to cut costs and streamline operations for increased efficiency. According to data compiled by Layoffs.fyi, an online tracker that keep tabs on job losses in the technology sector, 123,941 tech employees were laid off at 269 companies in 2025. The site also reports that 71,981 government employees were laid off by DOGE alone, with 182,528 total federal workers laid off. Here is a list — to be updated regularly — of some of the most prominent technology layoffs the industry has experienced recently. Notable tech layoffs in 2026 Monday.com Microsoft Meta Cisco Cloudflare Oracle Atlassian Salesforce Amazon Ericsson July 22, 2026: Monday.com cuts 20% of its workforce to restructure for the AI era The company says the decision to cut 620 jobs isn’t about margins, but about creating a flatter organization built around AI agents, autonomous teams, and deeper customer engagement. July 6, 2026: Microsoft cuts 4,800 jobs, primarily in sales and Xbox teams As the company trims thousands of jobs, it’s also investing in embedded engineering teams and AI infrastructure. The layoffs come several weeks after the company offered 8,750 US employees voluntary retirement buyouts. June 5, 2026: Tech industry cut 38,242 jobs in May, worst since 2024 AI was blamed for 40% of the job cuts in May, up from 7% in January, according to research by employment placement company Challenger, Gray & Christmas. May 20, 2026: Meta cuts 8,000 jobs, around 10% of workforce The cuts are expected to expected to hit Meta’s engineering and product teams the hardest, arriving as Meta pivots toward AI to boost efficiency across its organization, according to Yahoo Tech. May 13, 2026: Cisco to cut nearly 4,000 jobs despite strong growth in AI, enterprise networking Despite reporting positive financial news — including record third-quarter revenue of $15.8 billion, a 12% year-over-year increase — Cisco said it will eliminate almost 4,000 jobs. May 7, 2026: Cloudflare to cut 1,100 jobs in AI-focused restructuring About 20% of Cloudflare’s global workforce will be culled as the company pivots for the agentic AI era, Reuters reported. April 1, 2026: Oracle to cut up to 30,000 jobs globally, putting enterprise support and roadmaps at risk Oracle began laying off employees on March 31 in what could be the largest workforce reduction in the company’s history. Employees received termination emails at 6 a.m. local time with immediate system lockouts and no prior warning. (Note: in June, CNBC put the final layoff tally at 21,000.) March 12, 2026: Atlassian cuts 1,600 jobs to fund AI and enterprise expansion Atlassian will reduce its global workforce by approximately 10%, eliminating around 1,600 roles, as the collaboration software maker redirects capital toward artificial intelligence development and enterprise sales. March 11, 2026: Tech layoffs surpass 45,000 in early 2026 A recent analysis by RationalFX found 45,363 job cuts globally so far this year—with roughly 68% or more than 30,000 occurring in the U.S. — highlighting ongoing workforce cuts even as many tech companies report strong revenue growth. February 10, 2026: Salesforce lays off staffers as executive leadership churn continues Salesforce has reduced close to 1,000 roles earlier this month across teams, including marketing, product management, data analytics, and its Agentforce AI unit, Business Insider reported, quoting employees familiar with the matter. January 23, 2026: Amazon layoffs expected to disproportionately hit AWS and tech talent As the market slows down, AWS and other Amazon units are preparing for another round of layoffs, which is expected to overwhelmingly impact tech talent. An email from HR leader Beth Galetti on Jan. 28 confirmed 16,000 job cuts. January 15, 2026: Ericsson plans to shed 1,600 jobs in Sweden  Ericsson lans to cut some 1,600 jobs in Sweden, the telecommunications equipment maker said doubling down on recent cost-saving measures that have helped it weather a prolonged downturn in telecoms spending, Reuters reports. January 13, 2026: Meta plans to cut around 10% of employees in Reality Labs business Meta plans to cut around 10% of the employees in its Reality Labs division who work on products including the metaverse, according to three people with knowledge of the discussions, according to The New York Times. Layoffs in 2025 Cisco Oracle Windsurf Intel Microsoft Crowdstrike HPE Autodesk HPE CISA Workday Salesforce Meta Global tech-sector layoffs surpass 244,000 in 2025 Economic uncertainty, elevated interest rates, and AI adoption have driven workforce reductions across tech companies worldwide, according to a RationalFX report. October 28, 2025: Amazon to cut 14,000 jobs across company Amazon will reduce its overall workforce by 14,000, cutting layers of management across the company and hiring in some areas to support its “biggest bets”. August 18, 2025: Cisco and Oracle to cut hundreds of Bay Area jobs Tech companies Cisco and Oracle are cutting hundreds of jobs across the Bay Area. Cisco will eliminate 221 positions at its Milpitas and San Francisco offices, effective Oct. 13. Oracle is reducing 101 positions in Santa Clara on the same date  August 5, 2025: 3 weeks after acquiring Windsurf, Cognition offers staff the exit door Cognition, the AI coding startup that acquired rival company Windsurf three weeks ago, laid off 30 employees last week and is offering buyouts to the roughly 200 remaining employees on the team, reports The Information. July 25, 2025, Intel to lay off 22% of workforce, CEO Tan signals ‘no more blank checks’ Intel will reduce its workforce to 75,000 employees by the end of 2025 as new CEO Lip-Bu Tan implements sweeping changes designed to transform the struggling chipmaker July 8, 2025, Intel layoffs begin: Chipmaker is cutting many thousands of jobs Intel has begun laying off employees across the company. CEO Lip-Bu Tan told workers back in April to expect major layoffs at Intel in the coming months as the chipmaker slashes costs and overhauls its organization after years of technical setbacks and falling sales. July 2, 2025: Microsoft will cut 9,000 workers Microsoft will lay off about 9,000 employees, a source familiar with the workforce cut told CNBC.  The cuts will reportedly affect less than 4% of Microsoft’s global workforce and will impact different teams, geographies and levels of experience. This is the latest in a string of cuts the tech giant has made this year. June 17, 2025: Intel looks to factory layoffs to return to profitability Intel will lay off up to 20% of its manufacturing sector employees starting in July, according to media reports, as the company looks for options as it seeks a return to profitability. The cuts reportedly will be made around the world, but some of the layoffs will be closer to home, according to a report in The Oregonian citing an internal company memo from Intel manufacturing Vice President Naga Chandrasekaran. May 7, 2025: CrowdStrike to lay off 5% of staff CrowdStrike announced a plan to cut about 500 roles, roughly 5% of its workforce, to streamline operations and reduce costs. The cybersecurity company will incur about $36 million to $53 million in charges related to the layoffs March 6, 2025: HPE cuts 2,500 jobs, remains committed to Juniper buy CEO Antonio Neri told Wall Street analysts that HPE would begin implementing a cost-cutting program involving layoffs of about 2,500 employees over the next 18 months. HPE employs about 61,000 people worldwide. Feb. 27, 2025: Autodesk to lay off 9% of workforce Software maker Autodesk is laying off 1,350 staff. With the rise of subscription and multi-year contracts billed annually, and self-service enablement, it finds it needs fewer sales staff, CEO Andrew Anagnost said in a message to employees. And with its cloud, platform, and AI products proving most profitable, it’s concentrating its staff and investments there. Feb. 27, 2025: HP to lay off 2,000 more As part of an ongoing restructuring, HP plans to lay off up to another 2,000 workers. In recent weeks, the company has tried — unsuccessfully — to do away with telephone support staff by forcing callers to wait for at least 15 minutes if they refuse to use self-service support resources online. The company swiftly backtracked, but wider job cuts are still on. Feb. 21, 2025: CISA lays off 130 Government employees get laid off too: In this case, 130 workers at the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency are being shown the door as a result of a DOGE decision. Cybersecurity experts are concerned that the cuts will harm the international collaborations that CISA has fostered, quite apart from their concerns about the security of the DOGE layoff process itself. Feb. 5, 2025: Workday lays off 1,750 As it moves to invest more in AI and international growth, Workday is laying off 8.5% of its workforce and disposing of unused office space. Some analysts fear the cutbacks will affect the company’s customer service — unless AI can pick up the slack. Feb. 4, 2025: Salesforce lays off over 1,000 At the same time as it’s hiring sales staff for its new artificial intelligence products, Salesforce is laying off over 1,000 workers across the company, according to Bloomberg. As of June, 2024, the company had over 72,000 employees, according to its website. Salesforce did not comment on the report. In 2024 the company reportedly laid off around 1,000 staff too, in two waves: January and July. Jan. 14, 2025: Meta will lay off 5% of workforce Mark Zuckerberg told Meta employees he intended to “move out the low performers faster” in an internal memo reported by Bloomberg. The memo announced that the company will lay off 5% of its staff, or around 3,600 staff, beginning Feb. 10. The company had already reduced its headcount by 5% in 2024 through natural attrition, the memo said. Among those leaving the company will be staff previously responsible for fact checking of posts on its social media platforms in the US, as the company begins relying on its users to police content. Tech layoffs in 2024 Equinix AMD Freshworks Cisco General Motors Intel OpenText Microsoft AWS Dell Nov. 26, 2024: Equinix to cut 3% of staff Despite intense demand for its data center capacity, Equinix is planning to lay off 3% of its workforce, or around 400 employees. The announcement followed the appointment of Adaire Fox-Martin to replace Charles Meyers as CEO and the departures of two other senior executives, CIO Milind Wagle and CISO Michael Montoya. Nov. 13, 2024: AMD to cut 4% of workforce AMD will lay off around 1,000 employees as it pivots towards developing AI-focused chips, it said. The move came as a surprise to staff, as the company also reported strong quarterly earnings. Nov. 7, 2024: Freshworks lays off 660 Enterprise software vendor Freshworks laid off around 660 staff, or around 13% of its headcount, despite reporting increased revenue and profits in its fourth fiscal quarter. The company described the layoffs as a realignment of its global workforce. Sept. 17, 2024: Cisco lays off 6,000 After laying off around 4,200 staff in February, Cisco is at it again, laying off another 6,000 or around 7% of its workforce. Among the divisions affected were its threat intelligence unit, Talos Security. Aug. 20, 2024: General Motors lays off 1,000 software staff More than 1,000 software and services staff are on the way out at General Motors, signalling that it could be rethinking its digital transformation strategy. In an internal memo, the company said that it was moving resources to its highest-priority work and flattening hierarchies. August 1, 2024: Intel removes 15,000 roles Intel plans to cut its workforce by around 15% to reduce costs after a disastrous second quarter. Revenue for the three months to June 29 stagnated at around $12.8 billion, but net income fell 85% to $83 million, prompting CEO Pat Gelsinger to bring forward a company-wide meeting in order to announce that 15,000 staff would lose their jobs. “This is an incredibly hard day for Intel as we are making some of the most consequential changes in our company’s history,” Gelsinger wrote in an email to staff, continuing: “Our revenues have not grown as expected — and we’ve yet to fully benefit from powerful trends, like AI. Our costs are too high, our margins are too low. We need bolder actions to address both — particularly given our financial results and outlook for the second half of 2024, which is tougher than previously expected.” July 4, 2024: OpenText to lay off 1,200 OpenText said it will lay off 1,200 staff, or about 1.7% of its workforce, in a bid to save around $100 million annually. It plans to hire new sales and engineering staff in other areas in 2025, it said. June 4, 2024: Microsoft lays off staff in Azure division Microsoft laid off staff in several teams supporting its cloud services, including Azure for Operations and Mission Engineering. The company didn’t say exactly how many staff were leaving. April 4, 2024: Amazon downsizes AWS in a fresh cost-cutting round Amazon announced hundreds of layoffs in the sales and marketing teams of its AWS cloud services division — and also in the technology development teams for its physical retail stores, as it stepped back from efforts to generalize the “Just Walk Out” technology built for its Amazon Fresh grocery stores. April 1, 2024: Dell acknowledges 13,000 job cuts Dell Technologies’ latest 10K filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission disclosed that the company had laid off 13,000 employees over the course of the 2023 fiscal year; it characterized the layoffs and other reorganizational moves as cost-cutting measures. “These actions resulted in a reduction in our overall headcount,” the company said. A comparison to the previous year’s 10K filing, performed by The Register, found that Dell employed 133,000 people at that point, compared to 120,000 as of February 2024. Dell announced layoffs of 6,650 staffers on Feb. 6, but it is unclear whether those cuts were reflected in the numbers from this year’s 10K statement. See news of earlier layoffs. ...