Why another Lucid layoff?
Too many people for too few cars. Lucid delivers 3 cars per head. Rivian, 7. Tesla, 43.
Lucid's on layoff number three of 2026, and it's only October. Twelve percent in February, a quieter WARN-notice-and-hope-nobody-notices round in April, then eighteen percent in June, and the COO walked out the door right behind the second shift at Casa Grande. New CEO Silvio Napoli got on the earnings call and said Lucid has been letting people down for way too long.
Let's go to the data and see how right he is.
Overhired, or the cars just aren't selling? Both. Take the last four quarters of deliveries and divide by headcount. Tesla moves a few dozen cars per employee. Rivian, about seven. Lucid, three and change, which even at Rivian's "productivity" means roughly twice the people it needs for the cars it actually sells.
Ask the workforce
Follow-up questions on this chart, answered from the same data.
Compare Lucid and Rivian engineering headcount since 2024.Which Lucid departments grew fastest in 2025 while unsold cars piled up?Lucid spent 2025 staffing up like the Gravity was going to defy gravity and sell itself. In Q4 it hit the build plan, then did the same thing for two more quarters. Problem is, the buyers didn't show, and by June that was four months of unsold inventory. Rivian builds five times as many cars and finished September with a rounding error in inventory. Same general market, same no-more-tax-credit hangover.
Ask the workforce
Follow-up questions on this chart, answered from the same data.
Did Lucid cut its sales and support staff in 2026?Which Lucid departments took the biggest hit in the April 2026 departure spike?Everybody else? Mostly fine. Lucid grew headcount 22% in 2025 and has handed most of it back. Rivian took its medicine early and went back to hiring. Tesla never really stopped. Scout, VW's South Carolina startup, is still growing on somebody else's dime, so I probably shouldn't list them here, but I did because I'm on the waiting list and keeping a close eye on them! Polestar's been bleeding for three years, so "fine" is generous. And if you want to see what actually-dead looks like, Fisker, Canoo and Nikola are all down about 90% from peak. Lucid's a long way from that. It's just the only one in the group hiring nobody while leading the league in departures.
| Company | Peak | From peak | Since Jan 2025 | Hires per 100 a month | Departures per 100 a month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lucid | Dec 2025 | -13% | +7% | 0.41 | 2.16 |
| Rivian | Feb 2024 | -13% | -4% | 1.09 | 0.94 |
| Tesla | Apr 2024 | -4% | +8% | 1.64 | 0.65 |
| Polestar | Jun 2023 | -38% | -24% | 0.52 | 1.11 |
| Scout | Aug 2026 | +1% | +81% | 2.85 | 0.83 |
| Fisker | Jan 2024 | -90% | -27% | 0.00 | 0.37 |
| Canoo | May 2022 | -91% | -70% | 0.00 | 1.12 |
| Nikola | Nov 2022 | -88% | -82% | 0.00 | 0.60 |
Ask the workforce
Follow-up questions on this chart, answered from the same data.
Where are people leaving Lucid going next?Who is hiring Lucid's engineers?Benchmark Lucid, Rivian, Tesla, Polestar and Scout on average tenure.Did the data indicate this was coming? Pretty much. Hiring fell off a cliff between September and November 2025, right as the lot was filling up and three months before the first layoff. Then Lucid stopped hiring recruiters. One since January. That's never a good sign.
Ask the workforce
Follow-up questions on this chart, answered from the same data.
How many HR and recruiting people has Lucid hired each month since October 2025?Is Lucid hiring in any department right now?