SYDNEY, November 4, 2026 — Canva is restructuring its global workforce in a move affecting 1,271 people, or 22 per cent of the company, with departing employees being offered at least six months of salary, permission to keep their company MacBooks and a year of LinkedIn Premium, alongside career and healthcare support.
Co-founder and chief executive Melanie Perkins announced the changes in an internal message published by Canva on Wednesday, describing the decision as the hardest moment in the company’s 13-year history. The company said the changes would affect roles, team structures and work locations. While the announcement includes layoffs, it does not say that all 1,271 people will be dismissed: some employees will face changes to their roles or be asked to relocate to centralised hubs.
The scale of the restructuring makes it one of Canva’s most significant organisational changes since the Australian design platform was founded. The company operates across 37 countries and has built a global business around software that allows individuals and organisations to create presentations, graphics, documents, websites and other visual content.
Canva said everyone leaving as part of the changes will receive at least six months of salary, inclusive of statutory entitlements, regardless of location. The company has also committed to removing the one-year vesting cliff for employees who joined within the past year, a provision that could otherwise prevent newer staff from receiving equity that had not yet vested.
Departing employees will be allowed to keep their Canva-issued MacBooks. Perkins said the decision recognised that not everyone has a personal laptop and that retaining a working computer could help people manage the transition and search for new employment.
The package includes one year of LinkedIn Premium and dedicated career support, including individual coaching and interview preparation. Canva said members of its Talent Acquisition team would help departing employees review their resumes and practise for interviews as they look for new roles.
Healthcare coverage will continue for 12 months in countries where Canva currently provides the benefit. Departing employees and their families will also retain access to Canva Care, the company’s employee assistance programme, for a year.
The company is setting up an opt-in alumni talent directory that it plans to share with investors, business partners and its wider industry network. The aim is to connect former employees with organisations seeking experienced talent. Employees leaving the company will also retain access to Slack and Gmail until the end of the week so they can communicate with colleagues and arrange their departures.
Another part of the package is the Canva Collective Fund. Departing employees can apply for grants of US$10,000 if they want to start a business or undertake a project for their local community. Canva said it would not take ownership or equity in ventures supported by the grants. Those interested have until December 14 to register their interest.
Perkins said Canva had experienced its hardest year yet and that growth had slowed for the first time in a decade. The company said it had considered a range of alternatives before concluding that smaller adjustments would not be enough to prepare the business for its next phase.
The restructuring is designed to simplify the organisation and give smaller teams greater responsibility. Canva will bring its Product, Growth and Platform teams together under a single Product organisation. It says the existing arrangement created too many handovers between groups working on different parts of the same product, making it harder to take responsibility for larger problems from beginning to end.
The company also plans to reduce narrow specialisations, consolidate overlapping responsibilities and remove management layers. The stated aim is to broaden roles and give teams clearer ownership, more autonomy and greater flexibility in deciding how to deliver product improvements.
These changes are intended to alter how work is organised, not simply reduce headcount. Combining teams can reduce coordination costs, but it can also create new demands on employees who take on wider responsibilities. The results will depend on whether the revised structure improves decision-making without weakening specialist expertise or placing too much work on smaller teams.
Canva is also changing where some of its teams are based. Sydney will become the primary home for more product teams and other roles where the company believes close collaboration is particularly important. Some employees will be asked to consider relocating to centralised hubs, with the company saying it will provide support for those decisions.
The company said it would continue investing in its global workforce, but argued that teams working closely together can solve complex problems more easily when they share context and spend time in person. From January 2027, most employees on hybrid arrangements are expected to work from an office for around two to three days a week, depending on their location and role.
The relocation element means the changes will not affect every employee in the same way. Some may be asked to move, some may take on different responsibilities and others will leave the company. Canva said the timing and process of individual discussions would vary across its 37 countries because local employment requirements differ.
The company said affected employees would receive individual meetings with senior leaders to discuss the changes and the support available. It also asked staff to respect the privacy of colleagues going through those conversations. A company-wide meeting is planned for November 10, followed by further organisational briefings.
The announcement comes as artificial intelligence is changing the market for creative software. Generative AI tools can produce images, layouts, presentations and other content from text prompts, while established design platforms are adding AI features to their products. This is changing what users expect from creative applications and how software companies compete for customers.
Perkins referred to the speed of technological change and the way it is transforming what people can create and what they expect from products. Canva’s statement, however, did not identify artificial intelligence as the direct cause of the job reductions. The company cited slower growth, organisational complexity and the need to prepare for its next decade as reasons for restructuring.
That distinction matters. AI is part of the competitive environment in which Canva operates, but the available announcement does not establish that the 1,271 affected positions are being replaced by automated systems. Nor does it provide a breakdown of job cuts by department, country or role that would show how much of the restructuring is connected to particular technologies.
Canva has been investing in AI capabilities as it expands beyond its original design tools. The wider industry is facing pressure to make creative software faster and more accessible while finding sustainable ways to charge for increasingly automated features. Established platforms must balance the cost of developing new technology with the need to retain customers and maintain growth.
For Canva, the restructuring therefore combines a response to slower growth with a broader attempt to simplify the organisation and sharpen product development. The company will need to demonstrate that the new structure can help it compete in a market where both established software firms and newer AI products are changing the boundaries of design work.
The immediate effect is being felt by employees whose roles are changing or ending. The longer-term test will be whether smaller teams, fewer management layers and closer collaboration help Canva deliver products that users continue to value, while maintaining the creative culture that helped it expand globally.
For departing staff, the severance package provides a period of financial support and practical help with the next stage of their careers. Six months of salary, continued healthcare where available, career coaching, a year of LinkedIn Premium and the ability to keep a laptop may ease some of the disruption. They do not remove the uncertainty of losing a job, particularly for employees who may need to relocate or compete for work in a changing technology sector.
Canva’s decision also highlights the difference between a company’s public commitment to supporting employees and the consequences of a large restructuring. The benefits are unusually broad, but the scale of the change remains substantial: more than one in five people at the company will be affected in some way.