The firm will sack as many as 687 staff, representing around 10% of the workforce, according to reports in the Financial Times. As many as 250 London-based roles at Instagram will be axed. Staff at Instagram who have not been sacked are to be relocated back to the US, according to a report by Bloomberg. That includes Instagram boss Adam Mosseri, who moved to the UK last year to help build the app’s London team into a major global hub.

It follows a decision by Meta last month to cut another 10,000 jobs and eliminate 5,000 vacancies. In an update to staff, Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg told employees he would begin restructuring plans focused on flattening teams, canceling lower priority projects, and reducing hiring rates.

“This will be tough and there’s no way around that. It will mean saying goodbye to talented and passionate colleagues who have been part of our success,” he said.

Zuckerberg added: “At this point, I think we should prepare ourselves for the possibility that this new economic reality will continue for many years. Higher interest rates lead to the economy running leaner, more geopolitical instability leads to more volatility, and increased regulation leads to slower growth and increased costs of innovation.”

The cuts add to the 11,000 staff that were let go in November last year, amid restructuring aimed at slashing the company’s costs.

Meta’s Facebook UK employee headcount swelled 37% in 2021 to 5,148, filings with Companies House show, while its employee costs jumped to £1.4 billion, an average of £262,317 per worker and a 6% rise on the previous year. Meta could not confirm how many UK jobs would be affected as part of the layoffs.