Pinterest to Cut ‘Less Than 15%’ of Staff Amid AI Push
Pinterest said it plans to cut “less than 15 percent” of its workforce and reduce office space as it shifts resources to investing in artificial intelligence.
The search and discovery platform estimates the associated pre-tax fees will be between $35 million and $45 million, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Pinterest expects to complete its restructuring plan toward the end of the third quarter ending September 30, 2026. It had 5,205 employees as of Sept. 30, according to an earlier regulatory filing; This shows that the latest round of cuts affected fewer than 780 employees.
The San Francisco-based company plans to reallocate its resources to “AI-focused roles and teams that drive the adoption and execution of AI” and plans to prioritize AI-powered products, according to the filing.
Shares of Pinterest fell as much as 10% in New York on Tuesday.
Pinterest is the latest tech company to reorient its business to capitalize on the rise of AI products. Meta Platforms, Instagram’s parent company, also initiated layoffs in its Reality Labs division earlier this month, shifting resources from virtual reality products to wearable artificial intelligence products. Artificial intelligence has become a major focus of technology platforms, which are spending heavily on building data centers and other AI infrastructure to support new AI tools and services.
Pinterest’s move “likely signals more aggressive investments in the development of AI capabilities, which will negatively impact gross margin,” Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Mandeep Singh and Robert Biggar wrote in a note on Tuesday.
But they added that the company’s AI spending could help improve ad pricing, where it lags larger rivals like Meta on direct response ads.
Wedbush analyst Scott Devitt said the announced layoffs “are consistent with our thesis that Pinterest will face increasing threats from consumer adoption of competing AI-powered platforms and brokered commerce tools.”
“While it is too early to assess whether these moves will provide any comfort to investors, our bias for future estimate revisions is to the downside,” he added.
Pinterest will report fourth-quarter earnings results on February 12.
