eBay's Third 2026 WARN Says 229. Pitch the 198 It Moved to San Jose

eBay is cutting 1,000 to 1,100 jobs, about 9% of its 12,300-person workforce. Its October California WARN notice covers only 229 of them, all tied to 2025 Hamilton Ave in San Jose. Most recruiters will work through that list. I think the better pitch is the engineers who made it through all three of eBay's 2026 filings, and especially the 198 whose San Francisco office closed around them. None of those 198 appear on any layoff list.

What eBay filed in California in 2026

eBay filed three California WARN notices in 2026. Two were layoffs, totaling 500 people in the state. The third was an office closure that moved 198 staff to San Jose instead of laying them off. A WARN notice is a filing California requires before a mass layoff or site closure, normally 60 days ahead.

CEO Jamie Iannone's memo framed the October round as a way to simplify operations and shift resources to eBay's fastest-growing areas. A spokesperson told Reuters it affects around 1,000 people. The 9% figure works out closer to 1,100. eBay expects to finish most of the reduction by the end of Q1 2027, at a cost of $130 million to $150 million.

Some quick math on the October filing:

• California accounts for about 21% of the October cut (229 of roughly 1,100). The other ~79% fall outside the California WARN notice.
• Counting both rounds, 2026 cuts total roughly 1,800 to 1,900 people.
• The cuts are still underway, and the people still at eBay know it.

15%

Why the 198 relocated SF staff are the pitch nobody else is making

The 198 employees at 300 Mission St kept their jobs but lost their office on September 30, 2026. Their choice now is a commute to San Jose or a new employer. They weren't laid off, so they don't show up in layoff trackers, "open to work" pools, or the alumni spreadsheets that circulate after every round.

That's why they're worth your time. Anyone who joined eBay to work in San Francisco now has a South Bay commute they never agreed to. Then, weeks after the SF office closed, the October round cut another 229 jobs in San Jose. That's two shocks in quick succession for a group no layoff tracker surfaces.

Finding them is easy if you know what to look for:

• Current employer: eBay.
• Listed location: San Francisco. Profiles often lag a forced move, so an SF location on a current eBay profile is a good sign the person came from Mission St.
• Function: engineering, product, design, data. These match the functions in the October filing.

A recruiter who reaches this group in the first quarter after the move is talking to people mid-decision. Someone who reaches them in the second quarter is talking to people who have already decided.

Why layoff survivors leave faster than you'd expect

Layoff announcements push survivors toward the exit, and the push starts right away. A layoff survivor is someone who kept their job through a round of cuts.

Sima Sajjadiani at UBC Sauder studied about 1 million retail employees and found that layoff announcements have a strong and immediate effect on voluntary turnover among the people who stay. eBay has given its survivors two reasons to reassess:

1. A second announcement eight months after the first (February, then October) shows the first round wasn't a one-off.
2. The cuts run through Q1 2027, so survivors are deciding while they wait to see if they're next.

Employees also saw the October round coming. On TheLayoff.com's eBay board, people reported manager meetings appearing on calendars for October 21. Anyone who watched that happen had reason to start looking before the memo landed.

The cut list comes with a caveat. Charlie Trevor at Wisconsin found that people are 65% more likely to quit the job that immediately follows a layoff. If you hire from the 229, price in that retention risk: a stronger onboarding plan, a clear manager, and early scope.

Where eBay engineers actually work today

Most US engineers with eBay in their headline no longer work there. In Refolk's index of professional profiles, 570 US software engineers mention eBay in their headline, against 77 in India, but only 28% of the sampled US group still work at eBay, compared with 76% in India. In the US, eBay is mostly an alumni brand.

The "currently at eBay" shares come from samples of 25 or fewer, so treat them as directional.

28%

The cause is simple. Engineers keep eBay in their headline as a credential after they leave. So a keyword search for eBay engineers returns mostly alumni, at employers like Microsoft, Meta, Google and Intuit. San Jose is still the top US region, but a San Jose result with eBay in the headline is more often a former employee than a current one.

To find current employees, filter on the current employer field, not the headline. Refolk handles this split: you ask for engineers currently at eBay in the Bay Area and get back profiles with current and former employers already separated. You don't spend an afternoon clicking through alumni.

For teams that hire outside the US, the Bengaluru result is important. Most of the people tagged with eBay there still work for eBay, so that pool is current employees.

A third of the October San Jose cut was management

Twenty-six directors and 48 managers were among the 229 people in the October filing, about 32% of the total. The engineers who remain now report into fewer managers with more direct reports each, and many have lost the person who was advocating for their next promotion.

Value Added Resource obtained the breakdown. It lists software engineering, product management, design, data science and other corporate functions. When a third of a site's cut is managers, two things follow for the individual contributors left behind:

• A manager with a wider span of control spends less time per report.
• Promotion cases need a sponsor. When the sponsor is gone, the case usually goes back to the start.

So pitch what they just lost. Lead with:

1. A named hiring manager they can meet before they apply.
2. Defined scope for the first two quarters.
3. A promotion path you can describe in plain terms.

Compensation still matters. But a survivor with stalled prospects is often responding to the career problem first, and the salary second.

Which eBay teams to target, and which to skip

eBay is moving money into eBay Live, collectibles (Goldin and TCGplayer), Depop and agentic AI. Engineers on those teams are the least likely to leave. Focus on the core and legacy platform teams that sit next to them.

eBay is growing while it cuts:

• GMV across collectibles, eBay Motors, fashion and refurbished goods rose 24% year over year in Q3.
• eBay Live is generating GMV at a multibillion-dollar annualized run rate.
• In February, eBay agreed to buy Depop from Etsy for $1.2 billion in cash.
• Shares are up nearly 40% this year, against roughly 12% for the S&P 500.

When a company is growing and cutting at the same time, the cuts are a reallocation. Headcount moves from teams that aren't on the priority list to the ones that are. The engineers on funded teams also hold equity that has risen nearly 40%, which is a reason to stay. The engineers who just watched their budget move to another team are the ones open to an offer.

eBay's AI engineers rarely say so in their titles

Only 8 US profiles in Refolk's index combine an ML or data-science title with "eBay" in the headline, and 4 of them currently work there. This is the talent eBay is investing in, and a title filter barely finds it.

The work is real. eBay has deployed "real-time multimodal AI agents to extract structured item details directly from video streams." Whoever built that doesn't surface through an ML title filter. You find them through what they've produced: repos, conference talks, and author bylines on the eBay tech blog. Searching by hand means reading repo histories and talk abstracts one at a time to build a shortlist of a few names. That's slow, and while you're doing it the role stays open.

If you're filling an applied AI or ML platform role, decide early whether you want people from eBay's AI teams or engineers next to them who have already worked with those systems. The second group is easier to find and more likely to leave.

How to find eBay survivors by team, tenure and location

You find eBay survivors by searching current employees, not headline keywords, and then filtering by location, tenure and team. Taken together, these steps take you from 570 mostly alumni profiles down to a short list of people who are still there and have a reason to move.

1. Filter on current employer = eBay. This removes the alumni who keep eBay in their headline.
2. Split by location. Profiles still listing San Francisco are likely the relocated 198. San Jose profiles sit near Hamilton Ave. Bengaluru profiles are mostly current employees.
3. Use tenure as a filter. Anyone at eBay since before February got through both 2026 rounds.
4. Map teams to the funding list. Deprioritize Live, Goldin, TCGplayer, Depop and agentic search. Prioritize the core platform teams around them.
5. Prioritize individual contributors whose managers left. A "reports to" change or a new manager on a profile after October 21 is a signal.
6. Reach out before Q1 2027 ends. That's when eBay expects the reduction to be mostly done, and when survivors stop waiting to find out.

For the laid-off group, know the legal background before you mention severance. A California WARN tracker reports that all three of eBay's 2026 notices gave less than the 60 days the law normally requires, and Strauss Borrelli PLLC is investigating the February and October notices. Some candidates may be weighing a claim. Don't bring it up first, and don't make start-date promises that clash with it.

FAQ

How many people did eBay lay off in 2026?

eBay announced about 800 cuts (6%) in February and 1,000 to 1,100 (about 9%) in October. That's roughly 1,800 to 1,900 people, about 15% of the 12,300 employees it had at the end of last year. In California, the February and October WARN notices list 500 layoffs: 243 in San Jose and 28 in San Francisco in February, and 229 at 2025 Hamilton Ave in October. The 198 San Francisco staff in the April filing were relocated, not laid off.

Should I recruit laid-off eBay engineers or the survivors?

Both, with different expectations. Research from UBC Sauder shows layoff announcements immediately raise voluntary turnover among survivors, so the people who stayed are often open to a move. Work from Wisconsin found people are 65% more likely to quit the job right after a layoff, so hires from the cut list need stronger retention planning.

Where are eBay's engineers located now?

In Refolk's index, San Jose is the top US region for software engineers who mention eBay in their headline, but only about 28% of the sampled US group still work at eBay. In India, about 76% of sampled eBay-tagged engineers are current employees, and 14 of 25 sampled are in Bengaluru. If you're hiring outside the US, a Bengaluru search returns mostly current eBay staff rather than alumni.