Snap is laying off 16 percent of its workforce, blames AI

Snap is laying off around 1,000 staff, amounting to 16 percent of its workforce, which it will seemingly replace with AI. The cuts were announced in a company-wide memo from CEO Evan Spiegel, who added that more than 300 open roles are also being closed.

Spiegel said the "incredibly difficult" decision would likely save Snap more than $500 million by the second half of 2026, in turn helping it to "establish a clearer path to net-income profitability." Impacted staff were notified by email and the company’s North America-based team were instructed to work from home. Snap said it would provide four-month severance packages to those affected by the layoffs, as well as healthcare and other entitlements.

"While these changes are necessary to realize Snap’s long-term potential, we believe that rapid advancements in artificial intelligence enable our teams to reduce repetitive work, increase velocity, and better support our community, partners, and advertisers," Spiegel wrote. "We have already witnessed small squads leveraging AI tools to drive meaningful progress across several important initiatives, including Snapchat+, enhanced ad platform performance, and efficiency improvements in our Snap Lite infrastructure."

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