MENA Newswire, SEATTLE: Amazon is cutting about 16,000 corporate roles worldwide, marking its largest round of layoffs since 2023 and extending a broader reduction in office based headcount that began late last year. The company said the cuts affect corporate positions across Amazon and are separate from its large hourly workforce in fulfillment and delivery operations.
Amazon announced the reductions in an internal message shared publicly by senior human resources executive Beth Galetti. The company said it is working to support employees whose roles are eliminated, including providing most U.S. based corporate employees a 90 day period to apply for other positions inside Amazon, with timelines varying internationally to reflect local requirements.
The latest reductions follow a previously disclosed plan to shrink Amazon’s corporate workforce by about 30,000 roles. Amazon said in October 2025 that it expected to eliminate roughly 14,000 corporate positions. With the new round, the company has now confirmed about 30,000 corporate job cuts since October.
Amazon did not publish a full breakdown of the 16,000 roles by country or office location. The company has major corporate hubs in the Seattle area and across the United States, along with significant office based workforces in several international markets, including the United Kingdom and India.
Operational changes and support measures
In its workforce update, Amazon said most U.S. based corporate employees impacted by the decision will continue to receive pay and benefits during the transition window while they seek internal roles, with additional separation support offered where applicable. The company said it is prioritizing internal candidates for open roles as part of the process and that details will differ by geography due to local employment rules.
The job cuts span multiple parts of Amazon’s business, including teams tied to Amazon Web Services, Alexa, Prime Video, advertising, and supply chain optimization, according to reporting on the restructuring. Amazon has carried out several rounds of corporate layoffs since 2022, when many technology companies began trimming payrolls after rapid pandemic era hiring.
In 2023, Amazon eliminated about 27,000 roles in a series of workforce reductions that were among the largest in the company’s history. The January 2026 cuts are Amazon’s biggest since that period and come as the company continues to reset staffing levels across corporate functions.
Amazon’s overall workforce remains heavily weighted toward hourly roles supporting e commerce logistics, physical operations, and customer fulfillment. The company has said the current actions focus on corporate positions, reflecting changes in how teams are organized rather than reductions in the size of its frontline operations.
Recent context and market response
Amazon’s shares fell after the announcement, reflecting investor attention on the scale of the corporate reductions ahead of the company’s next earnings report. Amazon has not tied the layoffs to a single business line, and it has continued to make changes across parts of its retail and services portfolio while adjusting corporate staffing.
The company’s message emphasized that the reductions impact roles across Amazon and that support steps are intended to help affected employees navigate the transition. Amazon said it would communicate directly with employees about next steps and timing as the process moves forward in different countries and business units.