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Meta kicked off one of its biggest restructurings in years by sending overnight layoff emails to thousands of employees, cutting roughly 8,000 jobs while redirecting thousands more into artificial intelligence-focused teams.
Notices first landed in the inboxes of workers in Singapore around 4 a.m. local time Wednesday, while employees in the U.K. and the U.S. woke up to the same emails hours later. As the cuts unfolded, Meta also instructed North American staff to work from home.
The restructuring affects about 10% of Meta’s workforce, with more than 7,000 additional employees being reassigned internally to newly created AI-centered groups. Taken together, the layoffs and transfers reshape nearly one-fifth of Meta’s global workforce.
The email sent to affected employees said the layoffs were part of a "continued effort to run the company more efficiently" and would help offset other investments.
"Unfortunately, your role has been eliminated as part of today's reorganization," Meta wrote in the email.
Workers entering a paid non-working notice period were informed they no longer needed to perform duties for Meta and that internal access would be removed immediately.
"If you are already in the office, we ask that you please gather any personal items at your desk and head home," it stated.
The email further included immigration guidance for workers whose visas are sponsored by Meta and offered three months of external job placement support through Lee Hecht Harrison.
The overhaul marks the company’s largest broad workforce reset since CEO Mark Zuckerberg launched Meta’s "Year of Efficiency" campaign in 2022 and 2023, which eliminated over 20,000 positions.
Meta has already been cutting jobs this year, including layoffs at its Reality Labs division in January and additional cuts across multiple departments in March.
The company framed the layoffs as part of a broader effort to streamline operations and redirect resources toward artificial intelligence development.
Alongside the job cuts, the company has been reducing management layers across departments in an effort to flatten decision-making structures and speed up execution.
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