Senior Software Engineer, Search - USDS

Overview

Responsibilities:
About the Team Our Search Team is responsible for building and owning Tik Tok's search engine, which provides our users the best search experience. On the Tik Tok Search Team, you’ll have the opportunity to build a full-stack search engine system and combine information retrieval technology with modern machine learning methods from related fields such as NLP, CV, and recommender systems.

We embrace a culture of self-direction, intellectual curiosity, openness, and problem-solving.

• Architect and optimize large-scale search infrastructure to improve system efficiency and user experience, focusing on maximizing resource utilization (CPU/GPU/Memory), reducing end-to-end service latency, and ensuring high-throughput processing for peak traffic scenarios.
• Optimize the searching quality to provide Tik Tok's users the best search experience.
• Combine your understanding of product objectives and leverage modern machine learning and information retrieval techniques to improve search quality and perception.
• Build the core systems and algorithms development including query understanding, result ranking, query recommendation, system reliability, and related areas.

Minimum Qualifications:

• BS degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or other relevant majors
• At least 3+ years of experience in developing and implementing large-scale consumer-facing services/products and/or building backend services for large-scale consumer-facing applications
• Proficiency in the following languages but not limited to: C/C++, Python, Java or Golang
• Effective team communication and collaboration skills

Preferred Qualifications:

• Strong proficiency in system performance tuning and optimization, including the use of profiling tools (e.g., pprof, perf, gperftools) to optimize CPU/memory usage and a proven track record of reducing latency for large-scale, distributed services
• Working knowledge in one of the following or similar domains: search, recommendation, ranking, ads, etc.
• Working knowledge in one of the following areas: machine learning, deep learning, backend, large-scale systems, data science, full-stack
• Experience with Big Data Frameworks, such as Hadoop, Spark, Flink, etc.

Tik Tok USDS Joint Venture LLC is dedicated to the safety and security of millions of Americans who create, discover, and connect with what they love on the apps we operate. The Joint Venture has been established in compliance with the Executive Order signed by President Trump on September 25, 2025. Our foundation is a comprehensive data privacy and cybersecurity program we operate under defined safeguards to protect national security and secure U.S. user data, apps and the algorithm.

We safeguard the U.S. content ecosystem, holding decision-making authority for trust and safety policies and moderation. USDS Joint Venture helps ensure Americans can continue to express their creativity, discover new hobbies and interests, and build thriving communities and businesses on a global scale.

On-site presence across teams allows the company to operate with greater speed, alignment, and agility — especially in areas like real-time decision-making, team development, and integrated execution. As such, the company is shifting from a hybrid work model to a fully in-person schedule up to 5 days a week.

Inspiring creativity is at the core of Tik Tok's mission. Our innovative product is built to help people authentically express themselves, discover and connect – and our global, diverse teams make that possible. Together, we create value for our communities, inspire creativity and bring joy - a mission we work towards every day. We strive to do great things with great people.

We lead with curiosity, humility, and a desire to make impact in a rapidly growing tech company. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn and innovate as one team. We re resilient and embrace challenges as they come. By constantly iterating and fostering an "Always Day 1" mindset, we achieve meaningful breakthroughs for ourselves, our company, and our users. When we create and grow together, the possibilities are limitless.

Jo…