Amazon plans to hire 250K workers for the 2025 holiday season, the same as in 2023 and 2024, including full-time and part-time, and will pay $19/hour on average
Context & Ripple Effects
Amazon’s holiday staffing plans moved from 150,000 roles in 2021 and 2022 to 250,000 US holiday hires in 2023. Maintaining that larger hiring level for a third consecutive holiday period makes the seasonal workforce a recurring operating commitment rather than a one-year expansion.
The stated average pay frames the hiring push as both a capacity decision and a frontline-labor cost decision. It matters because fulfillment and delivery coverage must scale before peak demand arrives, not after orders do.
First-order effects
- Amazon opens 250,000 full- and part-time seasonal roles, expanding its immediate pool of warehouse, delivery, and related frontline labor ahead of the holiday period.
- Workers able to fill those roles gain access to jobs advertised at about $19 per hour on average, while Amazon commits to the associated seasonal payroll and onboarding effort.
Second-order effects
- A hiring campaign of this size can tighten competition for local logistics and retail workers during the peak period, pressuring other employers to compete on pay, schedules, or incentives.
- Holding the staffing target at the level established in 2023 signals that Amazon is planning holiday fulfillment around a sustained high-volume labor base, rather than reverting to the 150,000-worker plan used in 2022.
Third-order effects
- If Amazon continues to retain a 250,000-worker seasonal model, peak-period labor capacity may become a more entrenched competitive requirement for large retailers and delivery networks.
- The pattern points to holiday operations being managed through recurring large-scale flexible hiring, with wage offers remaining a central lever for securing that capacity.
The trend: Large retailers are institutionalizing high-volume seasonal hiring as a repeatable fulfillment-capacity strategy, with frontline pay used to secure labor at peak demand.