Microsoft Lays Off 6,000 Workers In Latest Tech Cutback

Microsoft has begun laying off nearly 6,000 employees—roughly 3% of its 228,000-person workforce—as part of a broad restructuring, Andrew Nusca reported for Fortune Tech.

This marks Microsoft’s largest layoff since early 2023. I Photo: SounderBruce Flickr

More than half of the cuts are in the United States, but the layoffs span across divisions, seniority levels, and geographies, from LinkedIn to Xbox. The company says the reductions are focused on streamlining management layers.

This marks Microsoft’s largest layoff since early 2023, when it slashed 10,000 jobs in a wave of post-pandemic cuts across the tech sector. Another 1,900 jobs were cut in 2024 following its acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

Among the “Magnificent Seven” tech giants, Microsoft has one of the largest workforces—Amazon, by contrast, employs over 1.5 million people, while Alphabet and Apple employ 183,000 and 164,000, respectively.

Microsoft recently posted strong earnings and reported spending $80 billion last fiscal year to build the infrastructure needed to compete in the global AI arms race.