Meta Platforms plans to lay off about 10% of employees in its Reality Labs division, the New York Times reported on Monday, citing three people familiar with the matter.
The cuts, which could be announced as soon as Tuesday, are expected to fall disproportionately on teams working on the metaverse, including virtual reality headsets and virtual social platforms. Reality Labs employs roughly 15,000 people.
Reality Labs has been central to Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg’s long-term bet on the metaverse, a strategy that has seen Meta invest heavily in immersive digital worlds. Since 2020, the division has reported cumulative losses of more than $60 billion, raising persistent questions among investors about the viability of the business.
Beyond the metaverse, Reality Labs develops Meta’s Quest mixed-reality headsets, smart glasses produced in partnership with EssilorLuxottica’s Ray-Ban, and augmented reality technologies. While the broader metaverse vision has struggled to gain traction, Meta has seen early commercial success with its smart glasses, at a time when rivals such as Google and Apple have yet to make a significant impact in the category.
Meta Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth, who oversees the Reality Labs unit, has called an in-person staff meeting for Wednesday, according to the report, which cited an internal memo.
The reported layoffs come as the Facebook parent company seeks to sharpen its focus and remain competitive in Silicon Valley’s intensifying artificial intelligence race, following a muted reception to its Llama 4 model.
