Canva CEO and co-founder Melanie Perkins announced a restructuring affecting 1,271 employees—about 22% of the company’s workforce. That number is not a confirmed count of job losses: the changes include redundancies, role changes and requests to relocate, and Canva has not specified how many employees will leave.
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Perkins described the overhaul as a way to “refound” Canva for its next decade. The announcement comes as the company reports its first growth slowdown in a decade.
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What Canva is changing
The restructuring is both an organizational reset and a workforce change:
- Combining teams: Product, Growth and Platform are being brought together into one Product organization. Perkins said the existing setup could involve unnecessary handovers and coordination.
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- Returning to smaller teams: Perkins said Canva needs small, empowered teams with more freedom to make decisions, take ownership and focus on users.
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- Simplifying responsibilities: Reports describe plans to consolidate overlapping work and simplify management layers.
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- Changing where some teams work: Some employees will be asked to relocate to central hubs. Sydney is set to become a primary base for more product teams.
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- Office attendance: From January 2027, most hybrid employees are expected to work from the office around two to three days a week.
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The 1,271 figure includes people affected by these different changes. It should not be read as 1,271 people losing their jobs: Canva has not disclosed the number of redundancies.
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Why Perkins called it a “hardest moment”
Perkins’s message described the decision as exceptionally difficult, while reporting quoted her calling it “without doubt the hardest moment in our thirteen-year history.”
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12 The changes affect more than one in five Canva employees and include job losses, role changes and relocations—not only a reshuffle of reporting lines.
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She also said small changes would not be enough to prepare Canva for its next chapter. The company’s growth had slowed for the first time in a decade, and reports say Canva cut its 2026 revenue-growth forecast from 30% to 20%.
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The company’s explanation also refers to technological change. Reporting on the memo says Perkins did not explicitly identify AI as the cause of the restructuring, so it would be too strong to describe the announcement as an AI-driven layoff plan based on the memo alone.
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What support is reported for departing employees
Reports say employees leaving Canva will receive at least six months’ salary, with healthcare coverage for a year in countries where Canva already provides it. Other reported support includes career assistance, such as coaching and job-search help.
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Departing employees are also reported to be able to keep their company laptops and apply for grants of up to $10,000 through the Canva Collective Fund to start a business or pursue a project.
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21 These benefits apply to departing employees; they do not mean that all 1,271 people affected by the restructure are leaving the company.