Monday.com blames AI for 600 layoffs — joining a growing list of tech companies doing the same

BitcoinWorldMonday.com blames AI for 600 layoffs — joining a growing list of tech companies doing the same

Monday.com, the Tel Aviv-based work management software company, announced on Wednesday that it will lay off approximately 600 employees — about 20% of its workforce — citing a restructuring plan tied to its “AI-driven growth strategy.” The company becomes the latest in a growing list of major technology firms that have publicly linked job cuts to the adoption of artificial intelligence, a trend that has accelerated sharply in 2026.

What Monday.com said about the layoffs

In an SEC filing, Monday.com described the cuts as part of a “restructuring plan” connected to its “ongoing transformation of its product, marketing, and go-to-market strategy” in support of “a leaner, more focused operating model.” Co-founder Eran Zinman told employees in a LinkedIn memo that the move “was not made to reduce costs or replace people with AI,” but rather to adapt the organization to an AI-first vision the company laid out roughly a year ago when it rebranded around a platform-wide AI push. Monday.com expects $45 million to $55 million in net restructuring charges but still projects up to 20% year-over-year revenue growth for 2026.

The broader trend: 140,000 tech jobs cut in 2026

According to a recent Financial Times analysis, U.S. tech companies have slashed nearly 140,000 jobs since the start of 2026, with Amazon, Oracle, Meta, and Microsoft alone accounting for almost 50,000 of those cuts. These reductions come as companies funnel hundreds of billions of dollars into AI data center buildouts. Interestingly, the FT also found that companies citing AI as a factor in job cuts have underperformed the Nasdaq by almost 10% in the 30 trading days following their announcements, suggesting the market doesn’t entirely buy the stories that companies are telling about AI-driven restructuring.

Not all cuts are straightforward — headcount is shifting

The picture is not uniformly bleak. The FT notes that AI-focused companies like Anthropic and OpenAI are hiring rapidly, absorbing some of the talent shed elsewhere in the industry. And within some of the very companies making cuts, headcount is shifting rather than disappearing entirely. Meta, for instance, earlier this year moved roughly 7,000 employees into new AI-focused roles even as it laid off 8,000 others. IBM says it’s tripling entry-level hiring for AI and hybrid-cloud roles alongside recent cuts.

20 major tech companies that have cited AI in layoffs this year

Below is a running list — in reverse chronological order — of the larger tech companies that have announced significant layoffs in 2026 with AI as a stated factor:

• Microsoft — July 9, 2026: Cut about 4,800 roles, most in its Xbox gaming unit. CFO Amy Hood said total headcount declined year-over-year and was expected to keep declining as the company focuses on “building high-performing teams” amid rising AI investment.
• Oracle — June 22, 2026: Disclosed it had reduced its workforce by 21,000 employees over 12 months, a 13% decline. The company said “the adoption and deployment of AI technologies across our operations have resulted, and may continue to result, in reductions to our workforce.”
• GitLab — June 3, 2026: Laid off roughly 350 workers (14% of staff) to fund AI infrastructure investment. CEO Bill Staples said agentic workloads are “pushing competitors to the brink.”
• Google — ongoing through 2026: Quietly cut employees across its Cloud division, including Threat Intelligence Group and Mandiant-linked cybersecurity staff. Over the past year, Google has cut more than a third of managers overseeing small teams.
• Intuit — May 20, 2026: Eliminated roughly 3,000 jobs (17% of workforce) in a restructuring centered on reducing complexity and reallocating resources toward AI.
• Meta — May 20-21, 2026: Laid off about 8,000 employees (10% of workforce) while moving about 7,000 employees into new AI-focused roles. CEO Mark Zuckerberg told staff the cuts were necessary because “success isn’t a given” in AI.
• Cisco — May 14, 2026: Cutting nearly 4,000 jobs (5% of workforce). CFO Mark Patterson said the restructure was “really not a savings-driven restructure… this is more realigning resources around silicon, optics, security and AI.”
• Cloudflare — May 7-8, 2026: Cut about 20% of its workforce (1,100 people). CEO Matthew Prince wrote that “the vast majority of those we laid off were measurers” — middle management, finance, legal, internal auditing.
• General Motors — May 12, 2026: Eliminated 500 to 600 IT jobs. A person familiar with the cuts told CNBC that AI played a role but wasn’t the only reason.
• Coinbase — May 5, 2026: Cut about 700 employees (14% of staff). CEO Brian Armstrong wrote that AI had changed the pace of work dramatically — “engineers use AI to ship in days what used to take a team weeks.”
• PayPal — May 5, 2026: Announced plans to cut around 20% of its workforce over two to three years (north of 4,500 jobs). CEO Enrique Lores said the company would “aggressively adopt AI” in its development processes.
• Snap — April 16, 2026: Cut roughly 16% of its global workforce (about 1,000 employees). CEO Evan Spiegel cited AI advancements as a key driver, saying “rapid advancements in artificial intelligence enable our teams to reduce repetitive work.”
• IBM — rolling through 2026: Estimates range from 3,000 to 9,000 U.S. positions eliminated, bringing IBM’s cumulative total since September 2024 above 15,000. Bloomberg reported IBM plans to triple U.S. entry-level hiring for AI and hybrid-cloud roles.
• Atlassian — March 11, 2026: Cut about 1,600 jobs (10% of workforce). CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said: “It would be disingenuous to pretend AI doesn’t change the mix of skills we need or the number of roles required in certain areas.”
• Dell — January 30 (disclosed March 2026): Total workforce fell about 10% in fiscal 2026 — roughly 11,000 jobs. The cuts came as Dell projected its AI-optimized server revenue could double in fiscal 2027.
• Block — February 26-27, 2026: Cut 4,000 jobs — nearly half its workforce. Jack Dorsey wrote: “We’re already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working.”
• Salesforce — February 10, 2026: Laid off fewer than 1,000 employees across marketing, product management, and its Agentforce AI unit. The company told Fortune that “because of the benefits and efficiencies of Agentforce, we’ve seen the number of support cases we handle decline.”
• Amazon — January 28, 2026: Cut 16,000 corporate jobs, following 14,000 cuts in October 2025. CEO Andy Jassy had said in June 2025 that “as we roll out more generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done. We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today.”

Why this matters for the tech industry and workers

The pattern of companies citing AI as a reason for layoffs while simultaneously investing heavily in AI infrastructure raises important questions about corporate accountability and the future of tech employment. The FT’s finding that companies making these announcements have underperformed the Nasdaq by nearly 10% in the following month suggests that investors may be skeptical of the narrative that AI-driven efficiency gains justify large-scale job cuts. Meanwhile, the rapid hiring at pure AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAI indicates that the job market is shifting rather than shrinking — but the transition is creating significant disruption for workers in traditional tech roles.

Conclusion

Monday.com’s layoffs are the latest data point in a year defined by tech companies simultaneously cutting headcount and doubling down on AI. With nearly 140,000 jobs eliminated across the sector in 2026 alone, the trend shows no signs of slowing. While companies frame these moves as strategic realignment rather than replacement, the cumulative effect is a fundamental reshaping of the tech workforce — one where AI expertise is increasingly valued, and traditional roles are being redefined or eliminated.

FAQs

Q1: Is AI really replacing jobs, or are companies using it as an excuse for layoffs?The answer is complex. While companies like Monday.com and Salesforce explicitly deny that AI is directly replacing people, the restructuring they describe involves reorganizing around AI-first strategies that require fewer workers in certain roles. The FT analysis showing that these companies’ stocks underperform after such announcements suggests some market skepticism about the stated reasons.

Q2: Which tech companies are hiring despite the layoffs?Pure AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAI are hiring rapidly. Additionally, within companies making cuts — such as Meta and IBM — headcount is shifting toward AI-focused roles. IBM has announced plans to triple its entry-level hiring for AI and hybrid-cloud positions.

Q3: How many tech jobs have been cut in 2026 so far?According to the Financial Times, U.S. tech companies have cut nearly 140,000 jobs since the start of 2026. Amazon, Oracle, Meta, and Microsoft alone account for almost 50,000 of those cuts.

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