Amazon is cutting 14,000 corporate jobs

Amazon is planning to axe around 14,000 corporate jobs. The mass layoffs were expected as part of the company’s cost-cutting drive, but are smaller than the 30,000 job losses previous reports had indicated.

Beth Galetti, a senior executive at the e-commerce giant, broke the news to employees in a message on Tuesday. “The reductions we’re sharing today are a continuation of this work to get even stronger by further reducing bureaucracy, removing layers, and shifting resources to ensure we’re investing in our biggest bets and what matters most to our customers’ current and future needs,” Galetti said.

Galetti did not give an indication of what roles are being cut or where they are located. Most employees will have 90 days to look for a new job internally, she said.

Galetti’s memo referenced a June message from CEO Andy Jassy sent to employees that evangelized generative AI as both a source of Amazon’s sought efficiency gains — read job cuts — and its strategic direction for products and services, and then went on to cite AI even more directly:

Some may ask why we’re reducing roles when the company is performing well. Across our businesses, we’re delivering great customer experiences every day, innovating at a rapid rate, and producing strong business results. What we need to remember is that the world is changing quickly. This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the Internet, and it’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before (in existing market segments and altogether new ones). We’re convinced that we need to be organized more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible for our customers and business.

In a statement sent after this article was published, Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said, “AI is not the reason behind the vast majority of reductions,” without citing specifics.

“Last year, we set out to strengthen our culture and teams by reducing layers, increasing ownership, and helping reduce bureaucracy to drive speed and ownership, and be set up to invent, collaborate, be connected, and deliver the absolute best for customers. This effort has begun to pay off, and we’re seeing strong results for our teams and customers. The reductions we’re sharing today are a continuation of this work,” Nantel continued.

Galetti’s memo says Amazon expects “to continue hiring in key strategic areas” in 2026, but will also keep searching for areas to “realize efficiency gains,” suggesting more job cuts may be on the horizon.

Amazon’s last major round of job cuts was at the end of 2022 and into 2023, when 27,000 workers were laid off. In its executive statements and corporate decisions, the company has shown how it plans to tap into automation, robotics, and AI while slashing labor costs and ultimately replacing thousands more positions for human workers.

Update, October 28th: Added statement from Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel.