Recently, multiple New Oriental employees have reported that the company is pushing forward with a new round of layoffs.

One employee affected by this round of cuts told a media outlet that in their city, most of those laid off were in functional roles, with the layoff ratio reaching around 20%.

In addition, several current employees have reported that the company has recently introduced a series of measures including "revised performance assessments," "lowered housing fund contributions," and "elimination of overtime pay for business trips," which employees have directly labeled as "disguised pay cuts."

This wave of "cost reduction and efficiency improvement" has even reached the Mid-Autumn Festival gift boxes that were distributed not long ago. On social media, many netizens claiming to be New Oriental employees posted photos of the gift boxes they received this year, commenting that they were "perfunctory" and "getting worse every year." Some even stated that the holiday bonus standard in their city had been significantly lowered, and some cities were reported to have "directly canceled the Mid-Autumn Festival bonus."

Regarding the situations reported by multiple employees, including "another round of layoffs" and "disguised pay cuts," as well as the reasons behind them, a media outlet sought verification from New Oriental's official channels, but had received no response as of press time.

Another Round of Layoffs, Functional Roles Hit Hardest?

Recently, posts have appeared on social media platforms from people claiming to be New Oriental employees, alleging that the company is initiating a new round of layoffs.

Many netizens identifying themselves as New Oriental employees said things like "this wave has layoff quotas across all branch centers nationwide," "I've already been notified that I'll be laid off," and "Guangdong not only has layoffs, but some high-level positions have been demoted."

Xiao Miao (pseudonym), an employee laid off during this round of personnel adjustments at New Oriental, confirmed to a media outlet that layoffs in their department were basically wrapping up, stating, "Most of those laid off in our city were in functional roles, at around 20%."

He also revealed that "sales and frontline teachers were less affected and probably won't be laid off for now."

A former New Oriental employee told a media outlet bluntly that this was not the company's first round of layoffs this year.

"As far as I know, this is the third wave. There was one in January, another in March, and now this is the third. But they've all been small-scale within departments. Some were directly last-place eliminations, cutting those with poor performance. It can't compare to the magnitude of the layoffs during the previous 'double reduction' period."

Discussing the reasons behind this round of layoffs, Xiao Miao said frankly, "It's mainly about the international education merger. Mergers always involve layoffs. Shanghai has already completed its merger."

This is not unfounded. In January of this year, market rumors emerged that New Oriental's overseas exam training and overseas study consulting segments would complete a merger before the end of fiscal year 2026. On March 17, New Oriental's press conference for the "Report on the Development of Chinese Students Studying Abroad" became the company's first official public response.

At the event, it was announced that the International Education Business Division was officially established, with Sun Tao, former president of Qiancheng Chuguo, appointed as executive vice president, and Liu Shuoyang, former president of the International Education Training Business Division, appointed as vice president.

The collective appearance of the leaders of both business divisions marked the merger's entry into the operational phase.

In fact, regarding whether business adjustments would lead to large-scale personnel optimization, New Oriental's management had previously given a clear answer.

In March of this year, Sun Tao, vice president of New Oriental and executive vice president of the New Oriental International Education Business Division, said in a media interview that technological changes and overlapping positions would bring about a small proportion of natural optimization, but there would be no large-scale layoffs.

"The overseas study services industry is essentially labor-intensive and requires substantial manpower input. The impact of technology is relatively small and slow."

According to media reports, Everbright Securities analyst Chen Yantong commented that "New Oriental has completed the organizational restructuring and merger of its overseas exam and consulting segments, achieving workforce reduction and efficiency gains by streamlining functions, and the business segment's profit margin is expected to improve in fiscal year 2027."

Overtime Pay for Business Trips Has Been Eliminated

If layoffs are only the surface of "slimming down," then a more widespread "shrinkage" is quietly happening to the paychecks and daily benefits of current New Oriental employees.

During the 2026 Mid-Autumn Festival, New Oriental employees received a gift box that left them with mixed feelings.

On social media, multiple employees posted photos of the company's Mid-Autumn gift boxes and complained, saying "a fruit box, dried apple slices, a few mooncakes, and a small plastic box—the gift boxes are getting lighter and lighter," "worse every year, and this year is just terrible," and "it feels like the gift box was made without care."

The weight of the gift box is still a minor matter. What truly chills employees is the subsequent "shrinkage" of holiday bonuses.

Amid the complaints about the Mid-Autumn gift boxes, many also reported that the holiday bonus standards have been lowered in the past two years.

It is understood that New Oriental distributes gifts or bonuses to formal employees during major holidays each year, including the Spring Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, and Teachers' Day, with longer-tenured employees receiving more.

But this long-standing benefits tradition may be breaking down.

On social media, many complained, saying things like "the double-festival bonus used to be 2,000 yuan minus over 200 for the gift box, now it's 700 yuan plus a gift box," "this year's Mid-Autumn bonus is only 150 yuan," and "ours was simply not given at all."

A New Oriental employee told a media outlet, "Previously, for Mid-Autumn Festival, non-regularized employees received 200 yuan each, those regularized for up to one year received 500 yuan, and those with one to three years received 800 yuan. But now this standard has been directly revised. New hires who haven't been regularized get no bonus at all—the 200 yuan tier has been directly eliminated."

In fact, under this wave of cost reduction and efficiency improvement, the "shrinkage" of holiday benefits is not an isolated incident.

The employee also said, "The Zhejiang school has already lowered its housing fund contribution ratio, from 12% to 5% starting in August this year. Also, there's no overtime pay for business trips anymore—it's all counted as compensatory leave, but compensatory leave easily expires, which amounts to giving the company free overtime."

Additionally, "performance adjustments" are another blunt knife, becoming a soft shackle hanging over employees' heads.

It doesn't directly cut base salary, but by resetting assessment rules and raising performance thresholds, it compresses variable compensation space, causing employees' actual take-home income to passively shrink, forcing them to face the reality of declining income expectations.

The aforementioned New Oriental employee said, "This year the department's performance targets are set very high. It feels like you'd have to work every minute without rest to meet them. If you slack off for even an hour, you can't finish, and if you can't finish, your salary certainly won't look good."

What follows is accelerated staff turnover. "So many people have left. Some don't even last three months before they don't want to stay. Even some supervisors have left."

Yu Minhong Reveals AI Replaced 15 People: Team Shrunk from 20 to 5

New Oriental recently released its latest financial report. In Q4 of fiscal year 2026 (March 1 – May 31, 2026), the company's net profit attributable to shareholders increased 775.8% year-on-year to $62.182 million; New Oriental's net revenue rose 23.0% year-on-year to $1.530 billion.

Judging from the financial data, New Oriental's current growth trajectory can be described as steady.

So why would a company with improving performance choose this moment to wield the layoff knife?

On social media, many employees point to the AI policies the company is vigorously promoting internally as the root cause.

When asked whether this round of layoffs stems from mid- and back-office positions being replaced by tools and AI, Xiao Miao said, "I'm not sure of the specifics, but the company has indeed been pushing AI all year."

In September of this year, at the 2026 Chongli Forum, New Oriental founder Yu Minhong gave a speech centered on AI.

He revealed, "Artificial intelligence has imperceptibly changed our work and life patterns and has become an indispensable part of today. On this premise, it will penetrate even more deeply into our lives in the future."

Yu Minhong also stated that New Oriental currently has more than 400 R&D personnel dedicated to combining education with AI.

At the same time, New Oriental is also commissioning external teams to participate in solving problems in education, daily life, and cultural tourism.

According to Yu Minhong, he hopes to use third-party perspectives to find new approaches to combining education with AI, rather than relying entirely on internal R&D.

The changes brought by AI have already entered New Oriental's actual work. He revealed that New Oriental teachers now spend only one-fifth of the time they used to on lesson preparation. With AI's help, his own work team, which originally had at least 20 people, has been reduced to about 5.

It is worth noting that in New Oriental's official narrative for fiscal year 2026, artificial intelligence has been placed as a core organizational priority.

New Oriental CEO Zhou Chenggang has stated, "Artificial intelligence has become our core organizational priority. We will further strengthen the OMO teaching system, deepen the integration of artificial intelligence in the education ecosystem, embed AI into existing products and services, continuously refine AI-driven products, and deploy AI to improve operational efficiency and support for the teaching team."

At the earnings conference call, New Oriental's management also stated that the company has already invested substantial manpower and resources in AI, bringing AI technology into its education business.

They also mentioned, "The company is using AI technology to improve work efficiency and thereby save labor costs. Across all teachers and teaching assistants, throughout every aspect of their workflow, AI tools can be used to improve work effectiveness. This way, we don't need to add as many new personnel as before. Existing employees can handle more work than before, further saving labor costs and improving overall efficiency. The same approach applies to functional back-office support positions."