Colorado Layoffs November 2026: WARN Numbers Explained

Colorado's layoff picture in 2026 is quieter than it looks at first glance — and the reason is not that layoffs stopped. It is that the state's official WARN record has gone silent, leaving the numbers to come almost entirely from secondary reports.

Layoff Atlas tracks 842 non-cancelled imported WARN notices for Colorado, reporting 87,942 workers affected across the full archive. In 2026 so far, the count stands at 41 notices and 5,060 reported workers. These are reported plans, not confirmed job losses: a WARN notice records an employer's stated intention to cut jobs or close a facility, and the figures describe what was filed, not what ultimately happened.

A year running below the recent average

Colorado's 2026 filing pace is the slowest in the archive outside of 2022. The year-by-year picture:

2026: 41 notices, 5,060 workers
2025: 69 notices, 5,877 workers
2024: 67 notices, 5,362 workers
2023: 89 notices, 5,762 workers
2022: 30 notices, 3,221 workers
2021: 41 notices, 3,951 workers
2020: 279 notices, 33,252 workers

The 2020 pandemic spike still dominates the archive: 33,252 workers, about 38% of every worker ever recorded for Colorado, were reported in that one year. Strip 2020 out and the state has run at roughly 5,000 to 6,000 reported workers a year since 2023. The 2026 total of 5,060 sits inside that band, even though the notice count is low — because the average 2026 filing is bigger, about 123 workers per notice, versus about 85 per notice in 2025.

The largest 2026 filings

The biggest single filing of the year is Tlingit Haida, with 295 workers effective September 28, 2026. Behind it: Accel, 246 workers, effective June 30, 2026; NR ParentCO, 141 workers, a Denver closure effective October 2, 2026; TIAA (update), 110 workers, effective July 1, 2026, in Denver; Public Storage, 107 workers, effective July 22, 2026; Aurora Mental Health & Recovery, 91 workers, effective June 30, 2026; Mission Foods, 90 workers, a Pueblo closure effective October 13, 2026; Montrose Forest Products, 90 workers, a closure effective September 8, 2026.

Closures feature heavily in the list: NR ParentCO, Mission Foods, Montrose Forest Products, 80 Acres Urban Agriculture (60 workers, Denver/Adams, effective August 3), and TIAA are all recorded as closures rather than layoffs. That is a different signal from a workforce reduction at an ongoing site — a closure means the location itself is going. Battelle in Pueblo also appears six times in 2026 with filings of 15, 1, 12, 18, 1, and 10 workers — small tranches that together describe a site shedding staff gradually rather than in a single event.

The official-filing gap

Here is the part of Colorado's numbers that needs the most care. During the last 365 days, the imported archive contains zero eligible official filings for Colorado, and the newest official notice date is May 29, 2025. Of the 842 notices in the full archive, only 2 are direct government records; 840 are attributed secondary records.

That does not mean Colorado had no layoffs in the past year. It means the state's official feed has not been feeding the registry, and the numbers are coming from licensed secondary archives instead. Secondary records are labeled as such, and they carry the same company, location, and worker-count fields — but they are not the same as a filing pulled straight from the state labor agency. Forty-seven Colorado notices have unavailable worker counts, which further softens the totals: the 87,942 figure excludes them entirely. Treat the 2026 total as a floor with a wide margin, not a precise count.

Colorado in the national picture

Nationally, the registry's 90-day window holds 694 notices and 64,044 reported workers, with 30 counts unavailable, updated November 9, 2026. California (21,514 workers) and Washington (17,411) dominate the window, followed by Illinois (3,432), Texas (2,750), and Maryland (2,475). Colorado does not appear in the national top five — its 2026 total of 5,060 workers is spread across the full year rather than concentrated in the current 90-day window.

The upcoming national calendar is heavy: 6,473 workers are scheduled effective in the week of November 9, followed by 6,202 in the week of November 16, 6,207 in the week of November 23, and 5,916 in the week of November 30. December 7 is the lightest week on the calendar at 898 workers, before December 14 rebounds to 6,274. Colorado's single future effective date means the state contributes almost nothing to that pipeline.

How to read Colorado's numbers

Three things to keep in mind. First, the 2026 total (41 notices, 5,060 workers) is on pace with recent years on workers but low on notices — fewer, larger filings. Second, the closure share is high: many of the year's biggest entries are sites shutting down, not trimming. Third, and most important, the absence of official filings in the last 365 days means the data leans on secondary sources; treat the figures as reported plans, not confirmed job losses, and expect revisions if the official feed resumes.

Colorado's story this year is not a surge or a collapse. It is a steady, mid-sized year with a data-coverage problem hiding underneath — and until the official notices start flowing again, the real count is probably larger than the one on the page.

Data source: Layoff Atlas