Amazon cuts thousands of jobs amid AI push

Wednesday’s cuts are the second mass layoffs in three months at the e-commerce giant.Published On 28 Jan 2026Amazon is slashing 16,000 jobs in a second wave of layoffs at the e-commerce giant in three months, as the company restructures and leans on artificial intelligence.Wednesday’s cuts follow the 14,000 redundancies that the Seattle, Washington–based company made in October. The layoffs are expected to affect employees working in Prime Video, Amazon-web-services" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="15962" data-entity-type="organization">Amazon Web Services, and the company’s human resources department, according to the Reuters news agency, which first reported the cuts.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemslist 1 of 4US president talks up economy amid outrage over Minnesota killingslist 2 of 4UPS says it will shed 30,000 jobs in major cost-cutting drivelist 3 of 4India curbs ‘grocery under 10 minutes’. But riders must still fatally racelist 4 of 4Tech giant ASML announces record orders in boost for AI boomend of listAmazon confirmed to Al Jazeera that all the cuts to the company will affect corporate-level employees.In a memo to the employees, shared with Al Jazeera, Amazon said workers in the United States impacted by the cuts will have a 90-day window to find a new role in the company.“Teammates who are unable to find a new role at Amazon or who choose not to look for one, we’ll provide transition support including severance pay, outplacement services, health insurance benefits [as applicable], and more,” Beth Galetti, senior vice president of People Experience and Technology at Amazon, said in the note provided to Al Jazeera.The announced reductions come amid a broader restructuring effort at the company. Earlier this week, Amazon announced it would close its brick-and-mortar Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh grocery stores, accounting for more than 70 locations across the US.Some of those physical stores will be converted into Whole Foods Market locations. Amazon acquired the Austin, Texas–based grocery chain in 2017, and it has since grown by 40 percent.