Microsoft Layoff History Timeline: Notices in 8 of 13 Years, and a July Filing in 3 of the Last 4

This Microsoft layoff history timeline runs to November 2, 2026. State WARN files name 14,964 workers at Microsoft and its subsidiaries since 2014, in 8 of 13 years and every year since 2023. The newest notice, dated September 22, covers 277 Redmond positions ending November 21. Microsoft’s largest 2026 round, on July 6, was about 4,800 roles.

1. Oct 26, 2026~60,000eligible for a Voluntary Exit Offer, per an unnamed CNBC source. Exits on Dec 31.
2. Sep 22, 2026277Redmond positions in a Washington notice. Separations Nov 21.
3. Jul 6, 20264,800roles stated by Microsoft. Notices dated that day name 1,036 in three states.
4. Jun 30, 2026223,000people, down 5,000 in a year. 4,000 of the drop was U.S.

Microsoft’s fiscal year starts July 1, so the record below is arranged by fiscal year, then listed date by date. Three kinds of evidence are kept apart: notices Microsoft filed with states, numbers in Microsoft’s own documents, and numbers only reported by the press. For how Microsoft ranks against other employers in the same notice files, see our tracker of tech layoffs in 2026.

Every Microsoft round on one line, 2009 to 2026

Circle area scales with the number of positions or workers. Hover for dates and counts. California files before fiscal 2015 were not available, so the 2009 WARN circles are Washington only.

Does Microsoft lay off every year?

No, but it has for four years running. Notices exist for 8 of the 13 calendar years from 2014 to 2026. The empty years are 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022. Notices in Microsoft’s own name exist for 6 years (2014, 2015, 2016, 2023, 2025, 2026). The rest come from subsidiaries: LinkedIn in 2020, and Activision Blizzard and ZeniMax’s Arkane Austin in 2024.

WARN workers are grouped by notice date. Headcount is the “employed approximately” sentence in each Form 10-K, rounded by Microsoft, and rises include acquired staff such as LinkedIn in FY2017, Nuance in FY2022 and Activision Blizzard in FY2024. “None we could find” means no dollar figure in that year’s 10-K, 10-Qs or earnings releases, not that no severance was paid.

Headcount fell in 3 of the last 12 fiscal years (FY2015, FY2016, FY2026). FY2015 and FY2016 followed the phone-business plans. FY2026 had press-reported cuts of about 9,000 and the retirement program, for a net fall of 5,000. Headcount went from 228,000 to 223,000, with U.S. staff down from 125,000 to 121,000 and international staff from 103,000 to 102,000. Revenue per person more than doubled from $678K in FY2014 to $1,488K in FY2026, so the 223,000 people today produce $332B of revenue.

How often does Microsoft lay off?

Since January 2023, Microsoft or a subsidiary has filed on 25 separate notice dates in 46 months, or about one every 1.8 months. Filing is not evenly spread: 10 dates in 2023, 4 in 2024, 8 in 2025 and 3 so far in 2026. A single round often produces several notices. After the January 2023 announcement of 10,000 cuts, Washington received seven Microsoft notices between January 18 and July 10.

Testing the July pattern

Workers in WARN notices by month of the notice date, all states checked, 2014 to 2026.

The pattern holds up, with limits. July is the largest month, at 4,277 of 14,964 noticed workers (29%, against 8% for an even spread). A July notice exists in 5 of 8 notice years, always in the first 17 days of the new fiscal year: Jul 17, 2014, Jul 8, 2015, Jul 10, 2023, Jul 2, 2025, Jul 6, 2026. It is missing in 2016, 2020, 2024. July was not the biggest month in 2023 (Mar) or 2025 (May): only 2014, 2015, 2026 peaked in July. Anyone watching only July would have missed the larger May 2025 notice of 1,985.

Every round, date by date

65 entries, newest first, with stated rounds beside the notices that followed. Numbers from different evidence types overlap and must not be added together.

WARN rows group a filer’s sites by state and notice date, using the employer’s notice date. Earlier-than-notice separation dates appear in LinkedIn’s California filings, so those rows carry no later date.

Washington: where the Redmond and Bellevue cuts were filed

Washington holds 67% of noticed workers since 2014 (10,016 of 14,964), and its database goes back to 2004. Since May 2025, the cover letters have split in-office positions from remote workers living in the Puget Sound area. 914 of 4,084 positions in those seven letters (22%) were remote.

n/a: the state grid gives no cover letter for that year, so no split is available.

The August and September 2025 attachments list 25 different buildings for just 82 positions, from numbered Redmond campus buildings to One Esterra and Studio A, B, D and G. The 2026 letters name only One Microsoft Way. Bellevue and Issaquah appear in location labels in 2023 and 2025, never alone, so no Bellevue-only total can be computed from the state’s data.

Other states and subsidiaries

LinkedIn’s May 15, 2026 filing of 606 California workers is the largest single-state filing of 2026 in this ledger, one more than Microsoft’s July notice in Washington, and it landed seven weeks earlier. On July 6, 2026 ZeniMax filed for 379 in Maryland (213 in Cockeysville, 166 in Rockville), on the same date Microsoft filed in Washington and Obsidian filed for 52 in Irvine.

Which teams the 2026 notices name

The two 2026 Washington notices carry a per-position job title. Parsing them gives exact counts: 605 of 605 and 277 of 277, matching the letters. We publish only title counts. Names and home addresses are confidential in these filings, and we did not keep them.

The two notices look different. July’s top titles are Software Engineering (133), Product Management (82), Business Program Management (51), Technical Program Management (34), Product Design (22), which fits Microsoft’s own description of changes “mostly” in Commercial and Xbox, with engineering restructured as well. September’s are Software Engineering (60), Art (29), Technical Writing (20), Game Producers (19), Game Design (16). Game art, design and production went from 7 positions (1%) to 77 (28%). Microsoft has not said what the September notice is for. These titles are consistent with part of the remaining 1,600 Xbox cuts, but that is our inference, not a filing statement. Managers were 20% of July positions and 21% of September’s.

WARN totals versus company-announced totals

WARN never comes close to the global number, because the company figure is worldwide and notices are per state. The 2014 plan’s 18,000 included about 12,500 Nokia positions. The WARN share here is a coverage measure and should not be read as a U.S. count. A tracker that adds notices can double up as well: WARNTracker’s Microsoft page lists 18,179 workers, but several rows repeat one notice under its layoff date, such as 1,985 on both May 13 and July 12, 2025. Our 2014-to-2026 count of 14,964 removes those repeats and adds subsidiaries.

Severance dollars and what filings say next

Microsoft has put a dollar figure on severance only for some rounds. The 2014 plan guided to $750M to $800M of severance. The 2016 charge carried about $200M. FY2017 shows $306M. The January 2023 charge carried $800M. For 2025 and for the July 2026 round we found no severance amount in any 10-K, 10-Q or earnings release. The July 29, 2026 earnings release says only that “lower-than-expected expenses related to the Voluntary Retirement Program” were partly offset by “severance expense and impairment charges in XBOX”, and FY26 operating expense rose in part on “impairment and other related expenses” at Xbox. The retirement program was guided at roughly $900 million on the April call, split about $350M in cost of revenue and $550M in operating expenses.

On further cuts, the documents are direct. Amy Coleman’s July 6 post says “there will be more changes ahead; other parts of our business will need to make similar changes.” The CFO said in April that headcount “will decrease year-over-year” in fiscal 2027, and on the July call that total headcount “declined 2% year-over-year”. The October 28 call says fiscal Q2 cost guidance “includes an estimate” for the Voluntary Exit Offer, with no amount given. Microsoft has used Form 8-K Item 2.05, the SEC’s item for exit and restructuring costs, only once since 2014: on July 17, 2014. The 2023 round went under Item 7.01, and the 2025 and 2026 rounds drew no 8-K of their own. Coleman also wrote that the eliminated roles “are not being replaced by AI”, a claim worth setting beside employers’ statements in our AI layoffs ledger.

What this means for MSPs

The checkable part: 60 of the 605 July positions in Washington were sales and partner titles, 25 of them with “Partner” in the title. Microsoft described the July cuts as mostly Commercial and Xbox. Advice, not a finding: if you rely on a named Microsoft partner contact, confirm that person and their backup now, and do it again after December 31, when Voluntary Exit Offer departures take effect. Do not plan for reduced Microsoft 365 or Azure support from these numbers alone: nothing in these filings measures support capacity.

Frequently asked questions

Does Microsoft lay off every year?

Not across its history, but it has since 2023. WARN notices from Microsoft or a subsidiary exist for 8 of the 13 calendar years from 2014 to 2026. There are none in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021 or 2022 in the states we checked. Notices appear in every year from 2023 to 2026.

How often does Microsoft lay off?

Since January 2023 Microsoft or a subsidiary has filed WARN notices on 25 separate dates, about one every 1.8 months. In 2023 alone there were 10 notice dates. Across the whole 2014 to 2026 record there were 34 dates in 8 years.

Does Microsoft lay off every July?

Often, not always. A July notice exists in 5 of the 8 notice years (2014, 2015, 2023, 2025, 2026), each in the first 17 days of the fiscal year that starts July 1. July holds 29% of noticed workers since 2014, against 8% if months were even. But July was the biggest month in only 3 of those 5 years.

How many people has Microsoft laid off in 2026?

Microsoft stated about 4,800 roles on July 6, 2026, or 2.1% of staff, and Xbox said it will cut about 3,200 through fiscal 2027. WARN notices dated 2026 name 1,919 workers: 1,036 on July 6, 277 on September 22 and 606 at LinkedIn on May 15.

Why do WARN totals sit far below Microsoft’s announced numbers?

Company figures are global and WARN is per state and per site. Across six rounds, the notices we found equal 2% to 42% of the stated or reported total. Washington alone is 67% of noticed workers since 2014, and many U.S. states we could not reach or that post no list are absent.

Will Microsoft lay off more people?

Its own statements say more change is coming. Chief people officer Amy Coleman wrote on July 6, 2026 that other parts of the business will need to make similar changes. The CFO said on the April 2026 call that headcount will fall year over year in fiscal 2027. Xbox has about 1,600 cuts left to make through fiscal 2027, and the Voluntary Exit Offer closes December 31.

Methodology

References

1. Washington Employment Security Department, WARN layoff and closure database and notice PDFs. Accessed November 2026.
2. California Employment Development Department, WARN reports, fiscal 2014-15 to current. Accessed November 2026.
3. Maryland Department of Labor, WARN log and annual tables. Accessed November 2026.
4. Texas Open Data Portal, WARN notices. Accessed November 2026.
5. New York State Department of Labor, WARN dashboard. Accessed November 2026.
6. Microsoft Corporation, Forms 10-K, fiscal 2014 to 2026, SEC EDGAR. Accessed November 2026.
7. Microsoft, Form 8-K Exhibit 99.2, Ballmer email, January 22, 2009. Accessed November 2026.
8. Microsoft, Form 8-K Item 2.05, July 17, 2014. Accessed November 2026.
9. Microsoft, Form 8-K Exhibit 99.1, July 8, 2015. Accessed November 2026.
10. Microsoft, Form 8-K Exhibit 99.1, May 25, 2016. Accessed November 2026.
11. Microsoft, Form 8-K Exhibit 99.1, Nadella email, January 18, 2023. Accessed November 2026.
12. Microsoft, earnings release, July 29, 2026. Accessed November 2026.
13. Amy Coleman, “The latest in our company transformation”, Official Microsoft Blog, July 6, 2026. Accessed November 2026.
14. “Resetting XBOX”, Xbox Wire, July 6, 2026. Accessed November 2026.
15. Microsoft FY26 Q3 earnings call. Accessed November 2026.
16. Microsoft FY26 Q4 earnings call. Accessed November 2026.
17. Microsoft FY27 Q1 earnings call. Accessed November 2026.
18. CNBC, May 13, 2025 (press, with spokesperson statement). Accessed November 2026.
19. CNBC, July 2, 2025 (press, unconfirmed number). Accessed November 2026.
20. CNBC, October 26, 2026 (press, memo and unnamed source). Accessed November 2026.
21. Fortune, September 12, 2024 (press). Accessed November 2026.
22. WARNTracker, Microsoft page (used only to find unverified leads). Accessed November 2026.