Meta is laying off 331 employees in Washington state as part of broader job cuts in its Reality Labs division, according to a filing with the state’s Employment Security Department.
The reductions will affect staff across four facilities in Seattle and the Eastside, as well as around 97 employees working remotely in Washington, the filing showed. The layoffs are part of companywide cuts to Reality Labs announced last week that will eliminate about 1,500 roles globally, GeekWire reported.
The largest number of job losses will occur at Meta’s Reality Labs office in Redmond, followed by its Spring District office in Bellevue, according to the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filing. A Meta office on Dexter Avenue North in Seattle, which houses the Horizon OS software engineering team, was also impacted.
The Horizon OS group, which develops the extended reality operating system that powers Meta Quest virtual and mixed-reality headsets, was the single hardest-hit team at that site, with 20 roles cut.
Layoffs are expected to take effect on March 20, the filing said.
Reality Labs, which develops Meta’s virtual reality, augmented reality and metaverse-related technologies, employs about 15,000 people, representing roughly 19% of the company’s global workforce of around 78,000. The division has posted multi-billion-dollar annual losses in recent years as Meta has continued to invest heavily in immersive technologies.
The Seattle region is one of Meta’s largest engineering hubs outside its Menlo Park, California headquarters, employing thousands of workers across multiple offices. The company has previously reduced headcount in the region, including layoffs of more than 100 employees in Washington state last October as part of cuts within its artificial intelligence division, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time.
The latest Reality Labs reductions come as Meta recalibrates its priorities, with executives increasingly emphasising next-generation artificial intelligence products and infrastructure over its earlier, more expansive metaverse ambitions.
Looking ahead, investors and employees alike will be watching whether further restructuring follows as Meta continues to balance heavy spending on emerging technologies with pressure to improve efficiency and returns.