Microsoft offers voluntary payouts to about 60,000 employees in four countries

Voluntary exit program

Microsoft on Monday announced a new Voluntary Exit Offer program, TechCrunch reports, citing Business Insider and Bloomberg. According to AFP, the company itself confirmed that the offer covers about 60,000 employees — roughly a quarter of the workforce. However, Microsoft has not officially disclosed the number of eligible employees; the figure of 60,000 was reported by The Verge, citing unnamed sources, as Anadolu notes.

Who the offer applies to

The offer is available to employees at the vice-president level and below in certain teams in the United States, Canada, India and the United Kingdom. According to AFP, some groups are excluded, including data center, sales and marketing staff. Anadolu, citing The Verge, specifies that the program applies to employees at level 70 and below, and that participating teams include AI Experiences, Copilot, CoreAI, Windows + Devices, Xbox, finance and HR; Cloud + AI, MicrosoftAI and legal units are partially included, while marketing, commercial business, discovery and quantum, and security are excluded. Participation depends on business priorities, customer commitments and staffing needs, chief people officer Amy Coleman said in a letter to employees. “The Voluntary Exit Offer is new for us. We will learn from this”, Anadolu quotes her as saying.

Terms and context

Employees who accept the offer will receive terms similar to standard severance pay, the outlets report. This is already Microsoft's second voluntary program in a year: in the spring, the company offered buyouts to employees of retirement age — according to TechCrunch, more than 30% of the roughly 8,750 eligible workers agreed; The Verge estimated the reach of that program at about 9,000 US employees, while CNBC, according to AFP, spoke of about 30% participation. According to The Verge, the new program will allow Microsoft to reduce headcount without a new round of layoffs — a few months after cutting 4,800 positions, mostly in Xbox and commercial sales. AFP notes that in July Microsoft had already cut nearly 5,000 employees, primarily in the gaming division. The company's headcount at the end of June was 223,000, down from 228,000 at the end of 2025, according to regulatory filings cited by AFP.

The backdrop of AI investment

AFP links the program to the company's attempt to cut costs amid large investments in artificial intelligence: Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta, according to the agency's estimate, will collectively spend this year about $700 billion on data centers, chips and computing infrastructure. Microsoft, according to AFP, said in July that it spent $41 billion from April to June and expects spending to rise to $50 billion from July to September, while revising its spending forecast for calendar year 2026 down to $175 billion from the previous $190 billion. CFO Amy Hood noted on a call with analysts that about two-thirds of the spending goes to “short-lived assets,” primarily chips. The company will release its quarterly report this week.

Significance of the event

The program affects up to 27% of Microsoft's workforce and shows how major tech companies are reshaping their workforce around AI priorities, preferring voluntary exits to new waves of layoffs — after cutting 4,800 positions in the summer, according to The Verge. For employees in the four countries, this means a real choice: leave now with terms comparable to severance pay, or stay amid the ongoing restructuring of teams. The scope also matters practically: the exclusion of data center and sales employees signalswhich areas the company considers priorities, although the final scale of departures will only become known after the program closes.