Laid off from Nissan.

What Nissan layoffs have meant for employees

If Nissan pays you directly, the cuts on record have reached people like you as offers you could decline, and the ones described in reports were open only to set groups, such as the Smyrna and Decherd technicians of 2007 and, per a January 2019 AP report and a January 2020 AP report, older workers. If you're outside the group an offer is drawn for, there's no offer to weigh. Interest has run ahead of Nissan's own estimates before. In 2007 acceptances passed the minimum Nissan had said to expect, NBC News reported from the AP, and in 2008 an unnamed company source put the initial response at more than twice what was expected, Workforce Management reported. If you're weighing an offer, the window Nissan sets has moved before, so the deadline and the price of leaving now rather than later both belong in the comparison.

At Canton, Nissan's own people and its contract workers have stood on different footing. Direct employees had the no-layoff pledge in 2019, and the January 2019 AP report said any affected among them would be moved to new jobs. Contract workers didn't. Marketplace reported in 2018 that every entry-level hire there was paid by a staffing firm that promised no permanent job, as Nissan and MINACT, one of its local staffing firms, both said. Kelly Services was Nissan's main agency, paying $14 to $17 an hour against $25 for the longest-serving Nissan workers, by workers' accounts, and temps became eligible for conversion after six months and an evaluation, though one former temp said it took him two years. Temps were the workers taken off the line when sales fell in the Great Recession, and in 2019 Mississippi's WARN list filed the Canton cut under Kelly Services/Excelsior. If an agency pays you at Canton, that listing shows whose name went first on the state's record of a contract cut there.

The reasons Nissan gave pointed at what was selling, from a car-heavy mix in 2007 that took fewer assembly workers to build, to slow van and Titan sales at Canton in 2019 and cooling global sales behind the 2025 buyouts, by its spokesman's account in Manufacturing Dive. Cost cutting has also reached pay, as when Nissan had its US employees take two unpaid furlough days in January 2020, the same January 2020 report said.

The 2025 and 2026 changes kept people employed while taking particular work away. In 2025 Nissan's spokesman said the shift reductions would bring no job cuts, and the buyouts were voluntary. At Smyrna the robot rollout will end the forklift and tug operators' current roles, and Nissan told Business Insider that they remain Nissan employees who can bid for other openings in the plant, and that some may get training for robot-related jobs. It won't backfill existing material-handling positions, and it's studying robots for stamping and weighing them for general assembly as soon as 2027. The plant's body and stamping director said he told workers on both shifts about four months ahead. If you hold a material-handling job at Smyrna, those are the roles the company has named, and what it has said is that the operators stay employed and bid for what's open.

For a Nissan job at the Franklin headquarters or the Smyrna or Decherd plants, our page on Tennessee unemployment benefits covers that state's claims, and for Canton it's Mississippi unemployment benefits. If a buyout offer reaches you, we cover negotiating a severance agreement separately.

A sourced history of Nissan layoffs

• May 2025, buyouts at Canton and for salaried staff

  Nissan offered separation packages to Canton plant workers and to salaried staff in human resources, planning, information technology and finance, an internal email reviewed by Reuters showed, as part of cuts taking its planned worldwide reduction to around 20,000 jobs.

• January 2025, Smyrna and Canton buyouts and shift cuts

  Nissan offered buyouts at both assembly plants, with until late March to decide, and planned to take the Rogue line at Smyrna and the Altima lines at Canton to one shift, a spokesman told Manufacturing Dive, with no job cuts. WSMV reported the January plan reached Smyrna and Decherd.

• November 2024, early retirement for about 1,000 US staff

  About 6% of Nissan's staff in the US accepted early retirement packages and were set to leave by year's end, a spokesperson said, according to Reuters via Arab News, as Nissan pursued 9,000 job cuts worldwide.

• January 2020, packages for US workers over 52

  Nissan offered voluntary separation packages to factory and white-collar workers over 52 and told eligible staff by January 31, according to the Associated Press. Its spokeswoman said the cut wouldn't reach the thousands and not every application would be approved.

• January 2019, Canton contract workers cut

  Nissan said it would cut up to 700 Canton contract workers as van and Titan sales slowed, and offered a buyout to workers 55 or older, the Associated Press reported. Mississippi's WARN list records 381 jobs, with a March 9 date of action.

• 2008, buyouts of up to $125,000 at two Tennessee plants

  Seeking about 1,200 departures from Smyrna and Decherd, Nissan offered $100,000 or $125,000 by tenure, a year of health coverage and a car-purchase discount, then extended the decision to mid-November, Workforce Management reported.

• 2007, buyouts at the Smyrna and Decherd plants

  Nissan offered 6,200 technicians a $45,000 lump sum plus $500 for each year of service, and 775 accepted, 681 at Smyrna and 94 at Decherd, NBC News reported from the Associated Press.

What to do if you're laid off from Nissan

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Nissan's biggest hubs: Tennessee, Mississippi. 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 Nissan's hub states run: Tennessee, Mississippi, 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.