Image: Marques Thomas/Unsplash
Amazon is once again trimming its workforce in Washington state, with nearly 2,200 employees expected to lose their jobs this spring.
A new state WARN filing indicates that the layoffs are across multiple locations, marking another significant round of cuts for the tech giant.
The reductions add to a growing list of corporate layoffs at Amazon over the past year, even as the company continues investing heavily in areas like AI and cloud services. For IT leaders and tech workers, the latest move is another indication of how rapidly priorities are shifting within large engineering-driven companies.
Layoffs Concentrate in Amazon’s Core Tech Workforce
In terms of specifics, Amazon plans to eliminate 2,198 roles statewide, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filing.
More than half of the impacted positions were tied to Amazon’s core product and engineering organizations.
Most of the cuts were centered in Seattle, with more than 1,400 workers affected there and over 600 more in Bellevue, where Amazon has been expanding its office footprint.
Amazon also noted in the WARN filing that employees who secure internal transfers before their separation dates will not ultimately be laid off.
Amazon Shifts Resources as It Reduces Layers
The reductions follow Amazon’s broader corporate layoffs announced earlier this year, impacting roughly 16,000 employees globally. Combined with a 14,000-worker reduction last October, this marks one of the largest corporate downsizings in company history.
Amazon’s restructuring plans surfaced after an internal email outlining redundancies was accidentally sent to employees on Jan. 27 before being withdrawn. “This is a continuation of the work we’ve been doing for more than a year to strengthen the company by reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy so that we can move faster for customers,” the email said.
The company has also tied workforce reductions to shifting investment priorities. In an October 2025 memo, Amazon HR chief Beth Galetti wrote that Amazon was “shifting resources to ensure we’re investing in our biggest bets and what matters most to our customers’ current and future needs.”
Seattle’s Tech Economy Feels the Ripple Effects
Amazon employs more than 50,000 corporate workers in the Seattle region, which serves as its primary headquarters. This makes the workforce reductions of this scale significant for the broader local economy.
Other major employers, including Microsoft, Expedia, Meta, and T-Mobile, have also trimmed headcount recently, showing a wider pullback across the tech industry.
Separately, Amazon is also laying off 400 workers in Washington due to the closure of Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores nationwide.
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