Amazon braces for fresh 30,000 job cuts

US e-commerce giant Amazon is likely to announce a second round of job cuts next week, in its plan to trim its workforce by 30,000, due to efficiency gains from artificial intelligence (AI), according to reports.

The new round of layoffs is expected to impact white collar roles across divisions including Amazon Web Services (AWS), the People Experience and Technology unit (human resources), Prime Video and retail, according to reports.

In October last year, Amazon reduced 14,000 white-collar employees from its workforce, around half of its total target 30,000. The magnitude of job cuts next week is expected to be of the same level, according to a Reuters report, citing sources.

The company was yet to comment on the report.

The e-commerce giant had linked the October round of job cuts to the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) software in an internal letter. “This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the Internet, and it’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before,” according to the letter.

Later, however, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told analysts during the company’s third-quarter earnings call that the reduction was not "really financially driven" or "AI-driven." He said, “it’s culture," alluding that the company had too much bureaucracy.

“You end up with a lot more people than what you had before, and you end up with a lot more layers," he said.

Jassy had said earlier in 2025 that Amazon’s corporate workforce would get smaller over time from efficiencies gained through AI implementation.

Though the job cut affecting 30,000 employees would be the largest layoff in Amazon’s three-decade history after 27,000-job cuts in 2022, it would represent a small portion of Amazon’s 1.58 million employees.

Affected workers could remain on the payroll for 90 days, during which time they could apply for jobs internally or seek other employment, according to reports.

Leading business executives of tech companies at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos said this week that artificial intelligence would not replace human jobs but can only reshape work by automating tasks.