Meta Platform Inc. is planning sweeping layoffs that could affect 20% or more of the company, three people familiar with the matter said, as the world’s largest social media company looks to cut AI costs and prepare for greater efficiency brought by AI-assisted workers.
No date has been set for the Meta Playoffs and the magnitude has not been finalized yet, the people said. Top officials have hinted at the plans to other senior leaders and asked them to start planning how to withdraw, the two people said. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to disclose job cuts.
“This is speculative reporting about a theoretical point of view,” Meta spokesman Andy Stone said in response to questions about the plan.
If Meta settles on the 20% figure, it would mark the company’s most significant layoffs since a restructuring in late 2022 and early 2023, which it dubbed “the Year of Efficiency.” The company laid off 11,000 employees in November 2022, or about 13% of its workforce at that time. About four months later, it announced it was cutting another 10,000 jobs.
According to its latest filing, as of December 31, 2025, Meta Platform employed about 79,000 people worldwide.
Focus on Generative AI
Over the past year, CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been pushing Meta to compete more strongly in generative AI. The company has offered top AI researchers huge pay packages to join a new superintendency team, worth hundreds of millions of dollars over four years.
The company has said that it plans to invest $600 billion to build data centers by 2028. Earlier this week, it acquired Moltbuk, a social networking platform built for AI agents. Meta is also spending at least $2 billion to buy Chinese AI startup Manus, Reuters previously reported.
Referring to efficiency gains from AI investments, Zuckerberg said in January that “projects that used to require large teams are now starting to be accomplished by one very talented individual”.
Meta’s plans reflect a broader pattern among major US companies this year, particularly in the tech sector. Officials cited recent improvements in AI systems as one reason for the changes.
In January, Amazon.com Inc. confirmed that it would cut about 16,000 jobs, about 10% of its workforce. Last month, fintech company Block cut nearly half its workforce, with CEO Jack Dorsey apparently pointing to AI tools and their growing ability to help companies do more with smaller teams.
Meta’s planned AI investment comes after a series of setbacks with its Llama 4 model last year, including criticism that it provided misleading results on benchmarks used for early versions. This left the release of the largest version of that model, called the Behemoth, scheduled for the summer.
The superintelligence team has been working to rehabilitate the company this year by creating a new model called Avocado, but that model’s performance has also fallen short of expectations.
