Canva Major Restructuring Affects 22 Percent of Workforce as CEO Melanie Perkins Announces Layoffs and Relocation Mandates

Popular design software giant Canva is undergoing a massive structural overhaul that will impact more than 1,200 employees, representing approximately 22 percent of its global workforce. The sweeping changes were announced by co-founder and chief executive officer Melanie Perkins, who detailed a difficult path forward that includes role reassignments, relocation requirements to centralized hubs, and significant layoffs. The move marks one of the most substantial workforce reductions in the tech sector for late 2026, arriving hard on the heels of similar contractions across the broader digital and software industries.

In a comprehensive note shared with staff detailing the strategic pivot, Perkins explained that incremental adjustments would no longer suffice to keep the company agile and competitive. After exploring a wide array of alternative strategies, leadership arrived at the difficult conclusion that small changes would simply not be enough to secure the company’s long-term trajectory. To properly set the organization up for the challenges and opportunities of the next decade, Perkins stated that Canva needs to effectively "refound" itself, getting back to its foundational roots of maintaining small, highly empowered teams equipped with the autonomy to make swift decisions, take personal ownership, and focus squarely on what matters most for its vast global community of creators and businesses.

The comprehensive restructuring touches nearly every corner of the company’s operational architecture. As part of the reorganization, Canva is officially bringing its previously distinct Product, Growth, and Platform teams together into a single, unified product organization. Leadership aims to streamline operations by simplifying organizational layers, consolidating overlapping responsibilities that have accumulated as the company rapidly scaled over recent years, and removing bureaucratic friction. Furthermore, the company is shifting its geographical focus, making Sydney the primary home base for a larger portion of its product teams, alongside critical roles in other specialized departments where shared physical context and close, day-to-day collaboration are viewed as especially vital to maintaining creative and technical momentum.

In tandem with these organizational shifts, Canva is tightening its remote work policies. Beginning in January, the company will expect most hybrid employees to transition to spending two to three days in a physical office each week, with exact requirements tailored depending on what makes sense in a given employee’s local area and regional office setup. This policy shift underscores a broader trend among major technology firms moving away from fully flexible arrangements toward localized, collaborative hubs designed to foster deeper in-person synergy.

For the employees whose positions are being eliminated, or who are unable to meet the new operational and geographical demands, the company has outlined a severance and support package. Departing workers are slated to receive benefits that include a minimum of six months of salary, up to twelve months of comprehensive healthcare coverage, and dedicated career support resources designed to help them transition into new professional opportunities.

The announcement from Canva follows a turbulent week for the software and tech industries at large. Just a day prior, Squarespace made headlines of its own by announcing widespread layoffs that impacted approximately 19 percent of its total staff, illustrating a persistent wave of cost-cutting and organizational streamlining among digital platform providers aiming to optimize their cost structures in a shifting economic landscape. As Canva navigates this pivotal transition, the company’s leadership remains focused on steering the design platform through its next generational chapter while supporting the thousands of team members navigating the profound workplace changes ahead.