Meta has laid off approximately 700 employees, with reductions centered in Reality Labs, recruiting, sales, and Facebook operations.
The cuts align with the company’s strategic pivot toward artificial intelligence, prioritizing AI infrastructure and elite talent acquisition over lower-priority divisions.
This shift comes just after Meta unveiled a stock option program for six top executives, potentially rewarding each with up to $921 million if performance targets-including a $9 trillion market cap-are met by 2031.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg continues to drive aggressive investments in AI, including superintelligence initiatives and compute infrastructure. Meta projects 2026 capital expenditures between $115 billion and $135 billion.
Reality Labs, the division behind Meta’s VR and AR efforts, appears to be the most affected, having already faced earlier downsizing plans of 10% to 15%.