Meta warns of deeper job cuts as morale sags; Microsoft offers first-ever buyouts

Key facts

• Meta plans to cut 10% of its workforce, about 8,000 jobs, starting May 20.
• Meta is also scrapping plans to fill 6,000 open roles.
• Meta HR chief Janelle Gale told staff she cannot rule out further layoffs.
• Microsoft is offering voluntary buyouts for the first time in its 51-year history, affecting up to 8,750 U.S. employees.
• Over 92,000 tech workers have been laid off in 2026, totaling nearly 900,000 since 2020, per Layoffs.fyi.
• Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said AI automation is not the driving factor behind the layoffs.
• AI token usage will not be considered as a factor for layoffs, Meta leaders said.

A single day of sweeping cuts

Meta announced Thursday that it will cut 10% of its workforce, roughly 8,000 jobs, with layoffs beginning on May 20. The company also said it will not fill 6,000 open positions. Hours later, Microsoft confirmed it will offer voluntary buyouts for the first time in its 51-year history, with about 7% of its U.S. employees eligible — potentially up to 8,750 people. The twin announcements pushed the total number of tech job cuts in 2026 past 92,000, bringing the cumulative count since 2020 to nearly 900,000. The moves come as the same companies spending hundreds of billions of dollars annually on AI infrastructure simultaneously seek efficiencies by reducing head count.

Meta’s internal uncertainty

In an internal meeting on Thursday, Meta’s chief people officer, Janelle Gale, told employees she could not promise that further layoffs would not happen. “I’d love to say that there are no more layoffs, but I can’t say something we can’t deliver,” Gale said, according to three sources on the call. She acknowledged that morale has been affected. Gale said the business is strong but that “priorities change, competition is fierce, and we will continue to manage our costs responsibly.” She added that Meta will “continue to evolve teams as needed” and “try to redeploy talent,” pointing to investments in the company’s Applied AI organization. Some organizations will be more affected than others, she said, without specifying which.

Zuckerberg addresses AI fears and monitoring

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressed the layoffs during the same meeting, stating that AI automation is not the driving factor behind them. He said AI has made small teams far more efficient. Zuckerberg also addressed Meta’s plan to monitor employees’ keystrokes and mouse movements to improve its AI models, clarifying that humans are not actually watching the staff and that the data is abstracted and used to improve AI. Meta AI chief Alexandr Wang appeared at the meeting wearing a camouflage-pattern T-shirt featuring multiple deer, according to a photo seen by Business Insider. During the Q&A, he praised Meta’s latest AI prowess, notably the recent release of its Spark model. Meta declined to comment for this article.

A structural shift, not a correction

“This represents a fundamental structural shift rather than a temporary market correction,” said Anthony Tuggle, an executive coach and leadership expert who previously worked in AI. “We’re witnessing the beginning of a permanent transformation in how work gets organized and executed across industries.” The cuts follow Amazon’s most widespread layoffs ever earlier this year and come as AI adoption accelerates across corporate America. Many economists and industry experts fear a labor crisis is already upon us, given how quickly AI is reshaping work. Workplace fears intensified last year as Anthropic’s Claude tools began performing tasks of entire business divisions, raising the specter that wide swaths of existing software solutions may be in jeopardy.

The widening gap between job loss and creation

Techno-optimists argue that AI is reshaping human work, not replacing it, and that new jobs will emerge as they did after previous disruptions. However, a 2026 Motion Recruitment study showed AI adoption is slowing hiring for entry-level and “generalized IT roles,” while AI positions are in high demand. Tech salaries remain largely flat from 2025, except for specialized roles like AI engineers. Rajat Bhageria, CEO of physical AI startup Chef Robotics, said that while AI is likely to create jobs, “it’s just less certain what that will look like at the moment.” He added, “We’re only starting to understand how much of our daily work AI can handle for us across all different kinds of jobs.”

What comes next

Meta’s layoffs are set to begin on May 20, and the company has not ruled out further reductions. Microsoft’s buyout offer marks a historic shift for the software giant, which has never before used voluntary separations. The combined effect of these moves, along with ongoing cuts at other major tech firms, suggests that the industry is entering a period of sustained restructuring. For employees, the anxiety is palpable. The question of whether AI will ultimately create more jobs than it eliminates remains open, but for now, the numbers point in one direction: nearly 900,000 tech workers have lost their jobs since 2020, and the pace is accelerating.

The bottom line

• Meta is cutting 10% of its workforce and has not ruled out further layoffs, with HR chief Janelle Gale telling staff she cannot promise no more cuts.
• Microsoft is offering voluntary buyouts for the first time, potentially affecting up to 8,750 U.S. employees.
• The layoffs are part of a broader trend: over 92,000 tech workers have been laid off in 2026, totaling nearly 900,000 since 2020.
• Experts describe the current wave as a permanent structural shift, not a temporary correction, driven by AI adoption and post-pandemic overhiring.
• AI is slowing hiring for entry-level and general IT roles while creating demand for specialized AI positions, widening the gap between job loss and creation.
• Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said AI automation is not the primary cause of the layoffs, and AI token usage will not factor into decisions.