How many employees work at IBM in 2026? Its layoffs explained | Official Website of Louis Velazquez, entrepreneur, finance guy and tech innovator

In business since 1911, International Business Machines (IBM) became one of the world’s leading technology companies through generations of visionary scientists and engineers. These highly skilled workers shaped the company from a data-processing business into a mainframe computing giant and, more recently, a dominant force in hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence (AI).

Under the leadership of current CEO Arvind Krishna, a quantum computing expert with a PhD in electrical engineering, IBM acquired Red Hat, an open-source software giant, in 2019. Doing so transformed the aging powerhouse into a major player in the hybrid cloud infrastructure sphere and enabled it to compete with OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google.

Shares climbed 40% in 2025 alone.

But this strategic shift came at a price: reshaping its present-day workforce. The tech giant has cut thousands of jobs over the past few years as it has pivoted towards higher-growth areas, such as cloud and AI.

In many ways, this embodies economist Joseph Schumpeter’s concept of “creative destruction,” when old ways of working are dismantled to create new, more efficient ones.

So, how big is IBM’s workforce now?

How many employees does IBM have in 2026?

According to IBM’s most recent annual report, the company’s workforce totaled 286,800 employees as of December 31, 2025. This number includes workers at IBM (264,300), its less-than-wholly-owned subsidiaries (8,700), and temporary and part-time workers (13,800).

In 2024, IBM reported a total count of 293,400 workers, which included employees at IBM (270,300), its less-than-wholly-owned subsidiaries (8,900), and temporary and part-time workers (14,200).

This suggests the company reduced its workforce by around 2%, making cuts across its wholly owned and less-than-wholly owned subsidiaries, while at the same time increasing its temporary and part-time headcount.

Where are IBM’s employees located?

IBM, also known as Big Blue because of its massive size and the color of its logo, has its corporate headquarters in Armonk, New York, about 35 miles from Manhattan.

The company also has offices and research labs on campuses in more than 170 countries across Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa, and Australia.

Its United States office locations include New York City, Austin, Research Triangle Park (North Carolina), Silicon Valley, and Rochester (Minnesota).
IBM’s global hubs are located in Tokyo, Montreal, and Munich.

Inside IBM’s recent layoffs

On November 4, 2025, IBM announced it would be cutting thousands of workers by the end of the year.

“We routinely review our workforce through this lens and at times rebalance accordingly,” a company spokesperson told Bloomberg. “In the fourth quarter, we are executing an action that will impact a low single-digit percentage of our global workforce.”

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But Fortune noted that not one week prior, Krishna had gone on CNN emphasizing he would be increasing hiring among college graduates, who have faced particularly strong headwinds recently in launching their careers, stating, “People are talking about either layoffs or freezing hiring, but I actually want to say that we are the opposite. I expect we are probably going to hire more people out of college over the next 12 months than we have in the past few years, so you’re going to see that.”

“On the net mix, it’s a plus for us,” he added, meaning that the company foresaw creating more roles than it would be reducing.

In 2023, IBM laid off approximately 1,900 workers, according to Reuters, as part of the spinoff of its Kyndryl business.

However, on February 13, 2026, Bloomberg reported that IBM plans to “triple entry-level hiring in the US in 2026.” IBM did not disclose specifics, but the roles are expected to be in customer engagement and AI management.