Tech industry cut 38,242 jobs in May, worst since 2024

Technology companies cut 38,242 U.S. jobs in May 2026, the highest monthly total for the sector since August 2024, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The year-to-date total of 123,653 tech job cuts marks a 66% increase from the same period in 2025, with artificial intelligence cited as the leading reason for layoffs across all industries.

Technology companies announced 38,242 job cuts in the US in May 2026 https://www.challengergray.com/blog/challenger-report-may-job-cuts-rise-16-from-april-highest-may-total-since-2020/ , the highest monthly total for the sector since August 2024, according to research by employment placement company Challenger, Gray & Christmas. So far this year the company has observed 123,653 US technology job cuts, a rise of 66 percent from the same period in 2025. These figures represent the third successive month that there has been an increase in job layoffs across all sectors, the company said. “The labor market is being reshaped by technology in real time. AI is now the leading reason companies give for cutting jobs and the primary industry citing it is technology,” said Andy Challenger, chief revenue office at Challenger, Gray and Christmas.” AI was blamed for 38,579 of the 97,006 job cuts announced across all industries tracked by the company. It accounted for 40% of the cuts observed in May, up from 7% in January. This year has already seen some major layoffs in technology. In March, HPE slashed 2,500 https://www.networkworld.com/article/3840596/hpe-cuts-2500-workers-expects-juniper-buy-to-close-end-of-25-faces-tariff-issues.html jobs from its wage bill, while Oracle announced plans to shed https://www.cio.com/article/4144164/oracle-to-shed-developers-as-it-brings-in-ai-tools.html an unspecified number of developers. And the cuts keep on coming, just last month, Meta shed 8,000 employees https://www.computerworld.com/article/4176447/meta-says-goodbye-to-those-who-wont-use-ai.html .