TikTok adds to January tech layoffs by letting go of 60 employees

Add TikTok to the list of companies that are cutting jobs at the start of 2024. The ByteDance-owned app has laid off approximately 60 employees, most of whom worked in the sales and advertising divisions.

NPR first reported on the layoffs on January 22. TikTok confirmed the cuts to CNBC on the following day. The affected employees included workers in Los Angeles, New York, and Austin. TikTok scheduled a town hall meeting on Tuesday to share the bad news.

TikTok’s latest layoffs come less than two weeks after Twitch let go of about 500 employees, and only a few days after YouTube announced its own round of pink slips. Like YouTube, TikTok chalked up its cuts to reorganization. Both companies have invited terminated employees to pursue other roles at the company. A TikTok spokesperson told CNBC that laid-off workers “may apply to any open internal roles, of which there are over 120 similar roles posted currently.”

Other creator-adjacent companies that have recently undergone layoffs include Discord and Unity. Within the tech industry, January has become a time of widespread reckoning. The start of 2023 saw a similar flurry of cuts, with companies like Google and Microsoft letting go of tens of thousands of staffers.

TikTok’s cuts have been comparatively small-scale, but layoffs have become a yearly menace for the popular video app. At the same time, TikTok continues to add to its workforce, particularly in areas like ecommerce. According to CNBC, the home of the For You Page employed about 7,000 U.S.-based workers at the start of 2023. Parent company ByteDance counts about 150,000 workers globally.