Laid off from Capital One.

What Capital One layoffs have meant for employees

The Illinois notices also reached people who worked from other states. Capital One counted remote employees outside Illinois as part of the Riverwoods group, and in the cuts announced in February 2026 the 538 remote workers living outside the state outnumbered the 532 people at the site itself, according to the company's letter as Banking Dive described it. The September 2025 and June 2026 notices counted remote staff the same way, in smaller numbers. That makes the Riverwoods figures a count of people spread well beyond the campus. If you worked from home for a Riverwoods team and lost your job in these cuts, the notice that counted you went to Illinois, whatever state you live in, which makes Illinois' filings the place to look for it. If your job was based in Illinois, Illinois unemployment benefits sets out that state's rules for a claim.

The 2026 cuts included large groups of technology and risk staff. Application engineers made up the largest group on the company's list of roles, ahead of senior associate and principal application engineers, with principal risk specialists and risk managers also on it, according to Payments Dive's April report. None of the September 2025 cuts were customer-facing, Capital One said, according to Payments Dive, though they reached Discover's chief marketing officer. In 2015, 2023 and 2026 alike, Capital One pointed people losing jobs toward its own openings. Its July 2015 WARN letter gave affected staff opportunities to seek roles at other Capital One sites, agile staff in 2023 were invited to apply for other positions, and in 2026 a spokesperson encouraged associates whose roles were eliminated to apply for any they were qualified for. If you're weighing an internal opening against a package, it's worth knowing that in 2023 the severance was for people who couldn't land another job inside the bank, according to Banking Dive's 2023 report.

Capital One has announced the Discover cuts in installments, each reaching Illinois as a new filing, and it has described them as part of integrating Discover. Asked in September 2025 whether more integration cuts were coming, a spokesperson said the bank had no other updates, and a much larger round was announced in February 2026. Asked again in March 2026, a spokesperson still had no other updates to share, and in June, according to the Peoria Journal Star, a supplemental notice added more layoffs. If you're on a former Discover team, that history is worth keeping in mind whenever the company says there's nothing new, because a quiet stretch hasn't marked the end of these cuts so far.

The 2024 merger agreement set a one-year severance commitment for Discover staff who stayed on after the deal took effect, for as long as they remained employed, and with the purchase completed in May 2025, that year ran out in May 2026, before the layoffs scheduled in the June and August 2026 supplementals. If you were on Discover's staff when the deal took effect, your separation date and any severance plan your paperwork names are worth comparing with those terms, though the agreement gave employees no right to enforce them.

Capital One's 2015 Oregon letter shows what one of its closing notices spelled out. It set the layoffs in phases, promised at least 60 days of written notice, said the workers had no union and no bumping rights, and made severance subject to "the terms of any applicable severance plan," starting when employment ended. If a Capital One letter reached you, it's worth checking it for the same lines, and if your paperwork names a severance plan, a full copy of that plan is worth having, since a later letter can differ from that 2015 one.

A sourced history of Capital One layoffs

• August 2026, another supplemental Riverwoods notice

  A supplemental notice dated August 4 set at least 431 more Riverwoods layoffs from October 6 to on or about November 5, according to Illinois' August 2026 monthly WARN report.

• June 2026, supplemental Riverwoods notice

  A June 2 supplemental added at least 276 more Riverwoods layoffs, expected August 6 to September 4, and a spokesperson put 141 at the site, 10 remote in Illinois and 125 remote elsewhere, according to the Peoria Journal Star.

• February 2026, Discover role eliminations announced

  Cuts announced February 23 were to affect at least 1,139 employees in 302 job titles, vice presidents included, Banking Dive reported from the company's letter. Illinois' count in the March 3 notice was 1,161, according to NBC Chicago.

• September 2025, Discover integration cuts at Riverwoods

  A September 15 notice listed about 382 jobs in 215 titles, 366 of them set to end November 17 and the rest by early March 2026, Payments Dive reported, with about 200 at Riverwoods, 18 remote in Illinois and 165 remote in other states.

• August 2025, Discover Home Loans wind-down

  After Capital One said in July it would wind down Discover Home Loans following a strategic review, an August 14 letter to Illinois covered 215 jobs, with separations scheduled from October 17 through May 2026, according to Payments Dive.

• January 2023, agile technology roles eliminated

  Capital One cut its agile technology roles, about 1,100 by Bloomberg's count, and folded their duties into engineering and product manager jobs, Banking Dive reported; staff who couldn't land another internal job were eligible for severance of at least 16 weeks' pay.

• November 2017, Plano mortgage and home equity exit

  Capital One said it would leave the mortgage and home equity business, close a call center and lay off about 950 people in Plano, where those businesses and its auto finance unit were based, according to NBC DFW.

• July 2015, Portland facility closing

  Capital One planned to close its Portland facility, cutting about 890 jobs in 62 titles in phases from October 2015 into the second quarter of 2016, according to its July 2015 WARN letter.

• August 2007, GreenPoint Mortgage shutdown

  Capital One said, according to the Associated Press, that it would shut GreenPoint, the wholesale mortgage unit it had gained months earlier with North Fork Bancorp, cutting 1,900 jobs and closing 31 locations in 19 states.

What to do if you're laid off from Capital One

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Capital One's biggest hubs: Illinois, Maryland, Texas. Somewhere else? Every state is here.
• Apply for financial and hardship assistance. Unemployment supplements income, but food benefits, health coverage and utility help are often available as well. Here's some of what Capital One's hub states run: Illinois, Maryland, Texas, and every other state is here.
• Mind the health insurance window. Losing coverage opens a 60-day special enrollment period, and an ACA plan usually beats unsubsidized COBRA. Compare your options before the employer coverage lapses, and read how the COBRA clocks run if you are weighing it seriously.
• Get your real runway number. Severance plus savings divided by reality. The calculator takes five minutes.
• Know which clocks are already running. Severance review windows, COBRA election, visa grace periods, and 401(k) rollovers all run on federal deadlines that started at termination. All five deadlines are here.