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Discord is laying off 170 employees after getting too big

Discord's reductions come days after cuts were made at Unity and Twitch. As with those companies, its cuts are by the hundreds.

Justin Carter, Contributing Editor

January 11, 2024

1 Min Read
Logo for chat app Discord.
Image via Discord.

At a Glance

  • CEO Jason Citron claims the cuts are being made to deal with the company's surge of employees in the last three years.

The layoffs are continuing this week, as Discord has cut 170 workers (or 17 percent) from its staff.

In a memo obtained by The Verge, CEO Jason Citron said the reductions would get the company to "sharpen our focus...and bring more agility." The cuts also address the company's ballooning headcount, which he claimed grew too fast.

Since 2020, he explained, the Discord team has grown to five times its size. With that staff, the company "took on more projects and became less efficient in how we operated."

Discord's place in games

In recent years, Discord has gradually evolved into a fixture of modern games. The voice app released on PlayStation 5 and Xbox systems, and developers have pivoted to it over forums as a community hub.

At the same time, it's also taken a more community and developer-focused bent. App makers can now monetize their works and revived its previously scrapped launcher for in-app games.

Discord's layoffs were preceded earlier in the week by Twitch, which let go of nearly 500 workers. Cuts were also made at VR developer Archiact, and at engine maker Unity.

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About the Author

Justin Carter

Contributing Editor, GameDeveloper.com

A Kansas City, MO native, Justin Carter has written for numerous sites including IGN, Polygon, and SyFy Wire. In addition to Game Developer, his writing can be found at io9 over on Gizmodo. Don't ask him about how much gum he's had, because the answer will be more than he's willing to admit.

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