Cloudflare Layoffs 1100 Workers AI Record Revenue 2026: CEO Says AI Made Their Jobs Obsolete

# Cloudflare Layoffs 1100 Workers AI Record Revenue 2026: CEO Says AI Made Their Jobs Obsolete

> **Quick answer:** Cloudflare cut 1,100 employees — about 20% of its workforce — on May 8, 2026, the same day it announced record quarterly revenue of $639.8 million. CEO Matthew Prince said the cuts were not about saving money but about AI rendering certain roles structurally unnecessary. Internal AI usage had surged 600% in three months, with AI agents now reviewing 100% of R&D code. This is the clearest example yet of a new corporate pattern: profitable companies eliminating headcount not because of financial trouble, but because AI has permanently changed their productivity math.

Cloudflare fired 1,100 workers in May 2026 while simultaneously reporting the best financial quarter in the company's 16-year history — and the CEO said explicitly that AI made those jobs obsolete. This is no longer a rounding error in tech earnings reports. It is a pattern, and it is accelerating.

## What Happened: Cloudflare's Record Quarter and Historic Layoff

On May 8, 2026, Cloudflare reported Q1 2026 revenue of $639.8 million — a 34% year-over-year increase and the highest single-quarter revenue the company has ever recorded. Remaining performance obligations reached $2.5 billion, also up 34% year-over-year.

On the same earnings call, CEO Matthew Prince announced the elimination of 1,100 positions, representing approximately 20% of the company's roughly 5,500-person workforce. This marks the first mass layoff in Cloudflare's history.