Microsoft offers to buy out a quarter of its workforce

Microsoft is offering voluntary exit packages to about 60,000 employees - roughly a quarter of its global workforce - in the United States, Canada, India, and the United Kingdom. Employees at internal level 70 or below may qualify, though eligibility also depends on which organizations Microsoft selects according to business priorities, customer commitments, and staffing needs. The company presents the program as an option for people already considering a move elsewhere, but gives no direct explanation for the offer. It comes as Microsoft manages costs while investing heavily in AI infrastructure and data centers.

This is Microsoft’s second voluntary workforce-reduction effort in 2026. An April retirement package targeted 8,750 US employees, and about 30 percent of those eligible accepted; in July, Xbox cut 3,200 jobs, around one-fifth of its gaming division. The new program reaches a much larger and broader group than the earlier retirement offer, which focused on long-tenured workers nearing retirement. Microsoft has said it is exploring more regular voluntary exits as part of workforce management, following a pattern also used by Google. Eligible employees are due to receive email invitations, leaving them to weigh a departure package against continued employment amid uncertainty about future layoffs.