- Amazon announced job cuts affecting fewer than 1,000 white-collar employees globally
- Layoffs mainly impact the Stores business, including customer service and engineering roles
- Employees in the US, India, and UK are affected, with no specific India numbers disclosed
Amazon has announced a fresh round of job cuts, with fewer than 1,000 white-collar employees reportedly affected globally. The company confirmed the layoffs on Wednesday. The cuts are reportedly concentrated primarily in Amazon's Stores business, which oversees the company's main e-commerce operations.
The latest reduction is occurring during the Prime Big Deal Days, Amazon's major shopping event, which began on October 6 and runs through October 7 in the US. In India, the cuts have come during the Great Indian Festival shopping period.
The layoffs have affected employees in the United States, India and the United Kingdom, making the latest restructuring relevant to Amazon's workforce in India as well.
Which Amazon Employees Are Affected?
Internal Slack messages reviewed by Reuters indicated that several parts of the Stores organisation were affected, including customer service and selling partner services.
Business Insider separately reported that the affected areas included customer service, marketplace support and engineering roles within Amazon's retail business, with cuts also reported in India and the UK.
Amazon confirmed the job reductions but described them as involving a "small number" of roles. An Amazon spokesperson said that the company had adjusted parts of its Stores business because it believed the new structure would better enable it to deliver its priorities. The spokesperson also said that Amazon was committed to supporting employees whose roles had been eliminated during the transition.
Will Amazon Employees In India Be Hit?
Yes, employees in India are among those affected by the layoffs. However, amazon has not publicly disclosed the number of employees affected specifically in India, meaning an all-India specific layoff figure cannot currently be independently confirmed.
Why Is Amazon Cutting Jobs?
Amazon stated that it has adjusted parts of its Stores business because the company believes that the new structure will allow it to better deliver on its priorities. The company said that it made the difficult decision to eliminate a small number of roles as it reorganises parts of the business.
The move is part of a broader effort by CEO Andy Jassy to make Amazon's organisation leaner, reduce bureaucracy and shift resources towards strategic priorities. Amazon's broader restructuring has also been closely linked to its increasing focus on artificial intelligence.
In October 2025, Amazon had announced an approximately 14,000 role reduction in its corporate workforce, stating that it was reducing organisational layers, increasing ownership and shifting resources towards major priorities.
In January 2026, Amazon announced another 16,000 corporate job reductions. Amazon also said that it expected to continue hiring in key strategic areas.
Role of AI
AI is an important part of the wider restructuring context. Amazon has been heavily increasing its AI investments while reducing or restructuring certain parts of its workforce.
Amazon said in its October 2025 layoff announcement that the current generation of AI was transforming technology and that the company needed to operate with fewer organisational layers and greater ownership.
Business Standard reported that Amazon is preparing to spend about $220 billion on data centres, chips and other infrastructure to support AI and related operations. However, Amazon has not said that its latest layoffs are solely because AI is replacing those jobs.
Jeff Bezos's Statement
In a Fox News interview aired on Wednesday, Amazon Founder and Executive Chairman Jeff Bezos said that Amazon had significantly increased its headcount during the Covid-19 pandemic as people stayed home and ordered more goods online.
The latest layoffs, therefore, form part of a continuing effort by Amazon to reshape its workforce after the company's pandemic-era expansion, while simultaneously increasing investment in areas such as AI.
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