Volkswagen is drawing up plans to eliminate 100,000 jobs across its global operations, doubling the scale of the cuts it had previously announced, according to reports from German media. The proposals, expected to be presented to the company’s supervisory board on 9 July, would represent a fundamental restructuring of the 89-year-old automaker and amount to roughly 16% of its worldwide workforce.
Job cuts and plant closures on the table
The revised overhaul envisages putting four German car plants under review before ending production at those sites. The facilities in question are Hanover, Zwickau, Emden and Audi’s Neckarsulm plant. More than 45,000 jobs in Germany alone would be put at risk, with production to be phased out as current models are discontinued. The company had previously agreed with unions in late 2024 to cut 50,000 roles by 2030, with a significant portion of those reductions already planned for Germany. That agreement had already secured around 28,000 job departures by 2030. Under the new proposals, the total number of job losses would double.
Volkswagen employed approximately 662,942 people globally as of 31 December 2025, including staff in Chinese joint ventures, of whom 284,032 were based in Germany. The latest figures put the global headcount in the range of 625,000 to 660,000. If the 100,000 job cuts go ahead, the company would shed about 16% of its total workforce.
Chief executive Oliver Blume and chief financial officer Arno Antlitz are reportedly leading the restructuring effort. The overhaul also involves plans to spin off the core Volkswagen brand and its parts manufacturing operations into separate entities, a move intended to make them easier to list on capital markets.
Cost savings targeted at €11 billion
The cost-cutting programme aims to deliver savings of €11 billion (£9.5 billion) by 2030. This compares with a previous target of more than €6 billion (£5.2 billion) that Blume had outlined to shareholders, when he said the company was on track and that “the transformation of the entire company is continuing to pick up speed”. In December 2024, Volkswagen reached an agreement with unions to reduce labour costs by €1.5 billion per year and achieve total cost savings of more than €4 billion annually through structural measures and capacity reduction.
As part of the broader belt-tightening, Volkswagen has also announced plans to cut investment by approximately 15% over the next five years, bringing planned spending to just over €130 billion. Factory costs at German sites were reduced by more than 20% on average in 2025.
Market challenges driving the overhaul
The drastic plans come as Volkswagen faces a perfect storm in its two most important overseas markets: the United States and China. Vehicle deliveries dropped by 10% in the US and 8% in China in 2025. The company blamed “challenging market conditions”, including tariffs on US imports that have raised the cost of selling cars into America, and intensifying competition in China from domestic electric vehicle manufacturers such as BYD, which have seized huge shares of the market.
The struggles in China are particularly significant for Volkswagen, given the country’s size and the company’s historic dominance there. However, recent data from early 2026 indicates that Volkswagen has regained the top spot in China’s passenger vehicle market, overtaking BYD, due to fading electric vehicle subsidies that had previously boosted the Chinese rival. Despite the downturn in the US and China, deliveries rose by 4.5% in Europe to almost four million vehicles, offering some respite.
The shift to electric vehicles is proving costly for Volkswagen, which has invested heavily in dedicated EV platforms and plants. The German factories under threat of closure each have specific roles in this transition: Emden exclusively produces electric vehicles from the ID. series; Zwickau is a key EV site manufacturing models including the VW ID.3, ID.4, ID.5, Cupra Born and Audi Q4 e-tron; Hanover produces commercial vans such as the ID. Buzz electric van; and Neckarsulm, operated by Audi, makes engines, hybrid technologies and electric vehicles including variants of the A5, A6, A8 and e-tron GT models. The planned phase-out of production at these plants would strike at the heart of Volkswagen’s electric ambitions in Germany.
The proposals are expected to face fierce opposition from German unions, including IG Metall and Volkswagen’s General Works Council, which have pledged to fight any such cuts. Labour representatives hold half the seats on Volkswagen’s supervisory board, giving them significant influence over whether the plans can be pushed through. Volkswagen has been contacted for comment.
