As of October 21, 2026, Level lists 20,000+ live jobs rated Works on AI or Builds AI, while layoff headlines keep coming. Challenger, Gray & Christmas counts AI as the most cited reason for US job cuts this year. Cutting and hiring are happening at the same time.
What happened
The September report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas came out on October 1, 2026. It counts 43,281 announced US job cuts for the month. That is 18% below August. Announced cuts for the year so far are 39% below the same period of 2025.
Technology is the largest source of cuts this year, at 29% of the total. The sector has announced 165,925 cuts so far. That is 54% more than at this point in 2025.
AI is the reason that stands out in the same report. Challenger attributes 120,136 announced cuts this year to artificial intelligence. That is about 21% of all cuts, and the leading reason year to date. In September alone, AI ranked fifth, with 3,961 cuts.
Two October announcements show how stated reasons differ. HubSpot said on October 6 that it will cut nearly 660 jobs. Its CEO said the cuts are not driven by AI-related efficiencies, and that the company is reorganizing around an AI strategy.
Netflix announced on October 14 that it will cut nearly 1,000 positions. That is about 6% of its workforce. The company described the move as organizational change, and the report does not mention AI.
Is AI really behind the layoffs?
Challenger puts AI at about one cut in five this year. It categorizes cuts by the reason employers announce. The figure therefore reflects announcements, not an audit of what changed inside each company.
The two cases above show the gap. HubSpot links its restructuring to AI but rejects the idea that AI efficiency drove it. Netflix gives a general reason.
For a job seeker, the useful reading is narrower. AI is a leading stated reason for cuts. Level also lists 20,000+ open roles rated Works on AI or Builds AI.
Who is hiring for AI work right now?
Level shows the other side of the ledger. As of October 21, 2026, it tracks 169,000+ live job offers. 20,000+ of them are rated Works on AI or Builds AI. That is about 12% of the total.
Hiring is recent. 1,700+ of these roles were posted in the last 7 days. 7,200+ were posted in the last 30 days.
The employers behind them are not only startups. Over the last 30 days, Amazon leads with 1,000+ listings at these two levels. NVIDIA follows with 289. Salesforce has 244. Capital One has 228.
The labs hire too. OpenAI has 129 listings at these levels. Anthropic has 112.
Which roles are open, and who can apply?
Software engineering is the largest category. 7,500+ of these roles are in it. 2,400+ are in data. 1,200+ are in research.
Seniority is where the pool narrows. Most of these roles are senior, with 10,000+ listings. Junior roles number 310. Internships number 799.
Candidates earlier in their career can start from the broader guide to junior AI jobs.
Remote work is more common here than in the whole catalogue. 32% of Works on AI and Builds AI roles allow remote work. Across all live offers, the share is 16%. Browse them on the remote AI jobs page.
What can a laid-off candidate do with this?
Match the level to your experience. Technology leads the layoff counts, and software engineering leads the open roles at these two levels. The Works on AI and Builds AI pages list roles by level.
Filter for remote roles if location is a constraint. To follow named layoffs, the Layoffs.fyi AI tracker keeps a running list.
What do these roles pay?
9,200+ of these roles publish a yearly salary range in US dollars. The median advertised salary for Works on AI roles is $207,800, taken at the middle of each range. For Builds AI roles it is $227,400.
These are advertised ranges, not what people are paid. Listings without a published range are left out. The levels page explains how each level is defined.
