Amazon cutting 49K desks, office space as company funnels billions into AI

In a move to reduce its office space globally, Amazon’s real estate team plans to cut 49,000 desks companywide this year.

Amazon’s Global Real Estate and Facilities (GREF) team detailed its plan to cut the company’s average office vacancy from roughly 31% to 22.9% in 2026, according to a transcript of an all-team meeting obtained by the Puget Sound Business Journal.

The plan could eliminate millions of square feet of office space across Amazon’s companywide offices as it aims to downsize to a level equivalent to its current workforce.

Amazon seeking to cut costs as it funnels billions into AI

As Amazon looks to invest billions of dollars into artificial intelligence, the company is seeking ways to cut costs to fund it.

Senior Real Estate Manager Martha Schwarzkopf Doyle said at the meeting that Amazon can reach its goal by allowing leases to expire, “hibernating” offices, and subleasing or terminating its leases when the majority of an office is vacant.

“If you can envision a sold-out Taylor Swift concert and give every single person their desk, that’s how many desks we need to get rid of,” Schwarzkopf Doyle said.

Cutting 49,000 desks would free up more than 10 million square feet of office space, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal.

In Seattle alone, as the region’s largest office occupier, Amazon employs roughly 65,000 corporate workers who occupy about 17.92 million square feet. Nationwide in 2025, Amazon had 40.2 million square feet of office space and an additional 28.3 million square feet internationally.

Amazon did not reveal where its office space cuts would be made, and declined to specify.

“We regularly evaluate our office footprint based on the needs of our business and employees,” an Amazon spokesperson wrote in a statement, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal. “Since 2023, when employees began returning to the office, we’ve prioritized spaces that foster the innovation and collaboration that drive our work and ensure we’re delivering for customers.”

Denny Triangle building among recent office space cuts in Seattle

Last week, Amazon confirmed that it would let its lease lapse on its 251,000-square-foot building in Seattle’s Denny Triangle neighborhood. That office has space for roughly 1,500 employees.

Even though Amazon aims to reach a global vacancy rate of 22.9% this year, Schwarzkopf Doyle said the company’s ideal vacancy rate is 11%, allowing employees space without being overcrowded.

Amazon also outlined its plans to add 1.8 million square feet of new office space this year, but it’s unclear where the space would be located.

GREF staffers heard of the plan just before CEO Andy Jassy announced to investors that Amazon would spend $200 billion on capital expenditures for artificial intelligence (AI) this year. A few weeks later, the company announced it would invest $50 billion into OpenAI.

Despite the return of a five-day in-office policy that took effect last year, a portion of Amazon’s real estate remains unused. Amazon averaged 29% occupancy across the U.S. between Jan. 4 and Feb. 28. Overseas, buildings in Asia and Europe averaged 35% and 39% occupancy, according to The Puget Sound Business Journal. 

Schwarzkopf Doyle noted that the office space surplus is a result of its “change in headcount strategy.” Two rounds of cuts laid off roughly 30,000 employees in October 2025 and January 2026, including about 4,500 in Washington.

Similarly, other leading tech companies have prioritized cutting costs to fund their AI investments, such as Microsoft, which recently confirmed it has no plans to continue construction of the five buildings included in its $5 billion Redmond campus expansion.

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