ORACLE UP TO 30,000AMAZON CONFIRMED 30,000ACCENTURE CONFIRMED 11,000DELL CONFIRMED 11,000META CONFIRMED 8,000CHEVRON NON-TECH 8,000MICROSOFT CONFIRMED 8,750BLOCK 40% OF CO 4,000SNAP Q1 1,000AI IS THE REASON · Not a recessionORACLE UP TO 30,000AMAZON CONFIRMED 30,000ACCENTURE CONFIRMED 11,000DELL CONFIRMED 11,000META CONFIRMED 8,000CHEVRON NON-TECH 8,000MICROSOFT CONFIRMED 8,750BLOCK 40% OF CO 4,000SNAP Q1 1,000AI IS THE REASON · Not a recession
Vol. IV · Issue 17The Layoff Record · 2026 Q2Updated 09:42 PT

So far this year,
0
tech workers
have lost their jobs.

That’s 1,002 people every day— at a pace 136% higher than Q1 last year. Nearly half of these cuts are direct AI replacements. This is not a downturn. This is a permanent restructuring.

Get matched to jobs →See the data
Total laid off · 2026 YTD
0
across 249 companies
People per day
0
+136% vs Q1 ’25
Cuts directly AI-driven
0.0%
role automation, not restructuring
Year-end projection
0
80% confidence · worst on record
§ 01 · Where the cuts came from

A dozen companies account
for most of the damage.

The top 12 employers below shed 124,875 jobsin the first four months of 2026 — more than the entire annual total in 2024. Confirmed cuts only.

Company
Workers cut
Count
% of co.
Oracle
30,000
18.5%
Amazon
30,000
~10%
Accenture
11,000
7%
Dell
11,000
10%
Meta
8,000
10%
Chevron
8,000
15%
Microsoft
8,750
7%
Block
4,000
40%
Atlassian
1,600
10%
Nike
1,400
—
Snap
1,000
16%
Disney
1,000
—
ConfirmedSource: company filings, press releases, internal memos · Apr 26, 2026
§ 02 · Five-year trend

2026 is on pace to be
the worst year on record.

Including the projected back-half wave, total tech layoffs in 2026 will exceed the entire 2023 cohort by 32% — and more than triple 2024.

050k100k150k200k250k20222023202420252026 (proj)93k200k80k127k270k
§ 03 · The paradox

$725 billion spent on AI.
128,270 humans cut.

Capital expenditure · 2026
$725B
Combined AI infrastructure spend across the four largest hyperscalers this year.
AmazonAI capex$200B
GoogleAI capex$190B
MicrosoftAI capex$190B
MetaAI capex$145B
Workforce reduction · same companies
45,875
Workers cut by those same four companies in the first four months of 2026.
Amazonworkforce cut30,000
Googleworkforce cut—
Microsoftworkforce cut8,750
Metaworkforce cut8,000
“The same companies spending billions to build AI are cutting the humans who built it.
— from a Q1 2026 internal memo, name withheld
§ 04 · The next wave

What’s coming next.

Confirmed cuts only tell half the story. These are the waves that haven’t hit yet.

• Confirmed · May 20

Meta · May 20 cut

All teams excl. AI/infrastructure

Meta confirmed 8,000 roles eliminated effective May 20, 2026 — 10% of workforce. An additional 6,000 open roles also cancelled. Further H2 cuts separately planned.

May 20, 20268,000 confirmed
✓ Completed · Q1–Q2

Amazon · second cut

AWS, devices, retail corp.

Second wave of ~14,000 corporate roles executed Jan–April 2026. Combined with Oct 2025 wave: ~30,000 total corporate cuts completed.

Q1–Q2 2026~30,000 total
○ Industry-wide forecast

Full-year projection

All publicly tracked tech employers

270,000+ total cuts forecast by year-end, with 80% probability. Current pace would exceed all prior years on record.

EOY 2026270,000+ projected
§ 05 · Role-by-role

Some roles are evaporating.
Others can’t hire fast enough.

Risk score combines layoff incidence, AI substitutability, and posting volume. The gap is widening every quarter.

● High AI replacement risk

Junior Developer
AI codegen replacing entry roles
92% risk
Customer Support
Chatbots handling tier-1
88% risk
Data Entry / Admin
OCR + LLM workflows
85% risk
QA / Manual Tester
AI test generation
78% risk
Middle Management
Layer compression
72% risk
Content Writer
GenAI commodity content
68% risk

● High demand · safer ground

AI / ML Engineer
+300% demand YoY
12% risk
MLOps / Platform
Hard to fill, $$$
18% risk
Cybersecurity
AI = bigger attack surface
22% risk
Prompt Engineer
$110K–$300K range
28% risk
AI Product Manager
+35–110% growth
30% risk
Specialized Sales
Enterprise AI close
38% risk
§ 06 · The job search, 2026

The road back is longer
than it used to be.

Avg. months to reemployment
0.0
up from 3.2 months in 2024
Salary loss on next role
−3%median
deeper for senior IC roles
Tech unemployment rate
0.0%
highest since dot-com bust
AI-adjacent roles · time to land
2–3months
half the median for everything else
§ 07 · Join the community

Don’t navigate
this alone.

LayoffWatch is a free community of 10,400+displaced tech workers, backed by a network of recruiters who hire from this list first. No spam, no scrapers, no “build your personal brand” nonsense.

  • →Vetted recruiters reach out to you, not the other way around.
  • →Private peer community — Slack & Discord — for leads, reviews, and support.
  • →Free resume review and personalized AI-skills gap report within 72 hours.
  • →Weekly digest of confirmed openings, salary bands, and interview loops.
Recruiter networkNorthstar TalentKingfisher SearchPlumb & Co.Halcyon Recruiting+ 38 more

Become a member

1,000+ members
We never sell, share, or scrape. Resume only visible to recruiters you approve.
§ 08 · What you get

A working group,
not a newsletter.

01 · RECRUITERS

Inbound roles, vetted

42 recruiters hire from this community first. They see your role and seniority before any public posting goes live.

02 · PEER COMMUNITY

Slack & Discord

1,000+ members swap interview loops, reference checks, salary bands, and (when needed) just commiserate. Moderated, private.

03 · RESUME + AI GAP

72-hour personalized review

Free resume review plus an AI-skills gap report — what to learn this quarter to stay ahead of the next wave.

873 people lost their job today

Don’t wait to
start looking.

The candidates who move first get the best roles. Average job search is now 3–6 months. Start the clock now.

Join the recruiter waitlist →