Tech workers in the Seattle area and beyond are reeling from Amazon mass layoffs that saw a record-high 30,000 axed globally in just three months.

On Wednesday, the company announced 16,000 job cuts across the organization. That's on top of layoffs in October that saw 14,000 cuts, including 2,300 across Seattle and Bellevue. The layoffs were aimed at reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy," according to a companywide memo from Amazon's head of human resources, Beth Galetti.

Many of those laid-off workers are bracing themselves for what could be a long and competitive job search, with local unemployment ticking upward and tech sector jobs remaining generally flat.

Employment in the information sector in Seattle and Bellevue has fallen significantly since its peak in 2022. Repeated rounds of layoffs at the region's biggest employers has rattled the sector, long seen as a source of stable and lucrative careers.

Now, high technology and information technology employers are no longer hiring as rapidly as they once did.

"These are industries and sectors that have had extremely high growth since the 1990s," said Anneliese Vance-Sherman, chief labor economist for the Washington state Employment Security Department. "What we saw in about 2023 to the present has been reduction in the size of that total workforce, and a workforce that still is likely to find jobs statistically, but having a harder job search than they've ever had."

In Seattle, the overall unemployment rate has increased over the last few months, ticking from 4.3% in August to 4.8% in December, according to the latest available seasonally adjusted figures. That's slightly higher than the national unemployment rate, which was at 4.4% in December.

The past year has been marked by heavy local layoffs at some of the region's biggest employers. Since January 2025, Microsoft has laid off at least 3,200 employees across Washington. Meta also shed approximately 400 employees, and Expedia on Wednesday announced that it would cut 162 positions.

Laura Close, chief executive officer of Close Cohen Career Consulting, a coaching service focused on the Seattle-area tech sector, said that her business has seen a 36% increase in outreach from Amazon employees over the past eight weeks.

"Hiring has not stopped," Close said. But the job market is vastly different today compared to a few years ago. Rather than hiring widely, companies tend to focus on roles that directly bring in revenue. Close said that the length of a standard job search for her clients has gone from between four to nine months up to between 12 to 18 months.

Longer timelines means that people have to stretch their severance and unemployment benefits further. When those resources don't go far enough, people resort to selling stocks intended for retirement income or they take out second mortgages, Close said.

Laid off Amazon workers that spoke with the Seattle Times reported receiving approximately three months of paid administrative leave, a period during which they'd technically be on payroll without being expected to work. On top of that, they said they'd receive severance payments based on how long they have been with Amazon.

The steady drumbeat of layoffs in recent months has heightened a sense of scarcity among people looking for work.

"When there's a tsunami of talent, the competition is very fierce," said Timothy Thomas, a tech career coach in Seattle. For most, it's hard to predict how long it'll take to land a tech job in 2026.

"The job market looks dire," said a software development engineer who got laid off on Wednesday. He requested that his name be withheld to protect future job prospects at Amazon, where he plans to apply to transfer into other teams.

The laid-off employee had been at the company for over a decade. Just days ago, he and his colleagues were commiserating about layoff anxiety over Slack. Immediately after losing his job, the employee was locked out of his work computer. "It's like you're totally isolated and there's no one you can talk to."

He's dreading the job application process. At Amazon, he'd been instructed to constantly document his use of artificial intelligence and estimate the technology's cost savings. He wonders if he was writing himself out of his own livelihood.

Tech giants like Amazon have slashed headcount in part to free up spending on artificial intelligence infrastructure.

On LinkedIn, some of his friends and peers in tech have marked their profiles with the "Open to Work" indicator — a badge that signifies an active job search — for two years and counting.

For now, he's still absorbing the shock of losing his job. "How am I feeling?" he said. "Pretty stressful, pretty sad, pretty upset.

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