Machine Learning Engineer Intern (TikTok-Data-Search-Visual Search) - 2027 Start (PhD)

TikTok; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 68,000 - 97,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Paid holidays

Housing allowance

Job summary

TikTok is offering a 12-week internship in San Jose for PhD students focused on search technology. You will work on designing, implementing, and iterating search features with guidance from engineers and mentors.

You will collaborate with engineering, product, data science, and ML teams, handling large-scale data and contributing to improvements in search quality for a global user base.

Qualifications

• Must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time internship.
• Currently pursuing a PhD in Software Development, Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or related technical discipline.
• Proficient coding skills and strong algorithm & data structure basis.
• Effective communication and teamwork skills.
• Experience in NLP, Ranking, Ads, search engines, recommender systems, distributed systems, and ML.

Responsibilities

• Support the design, implementation, testing, and iteration of Search features under engineers.
• Work with large-scale data, logs, metrics, or experiments to understand user search behavior.
• Collaborate with engineering, product, data science, and ML partners to define requirements and milestones.
• Write clear, maintainable code and documentation for assigned workstreams.
• Communicate progress, risks, and learnings with mentors and stakeholders.

Skills

Coding skills

NLP

Ranking

Machine learning

Distributed systems

Job description

Responsibilities

The Search team builds the systems that help users find relevant, reliable, and engaging content across TikTok. The team works across search retrieval, ranking, recommendation signals, query understanding, relevance, infrastructure, and product experiences. Our work combines large-scale machine learning, data-driven product development, and distributed systems to improve search quality for a global user base.

We are looking for talented individuals to join us for an internship. PhD internships at Our Company provide students with the opportunity to actively contribute to our products and research, as well as to the organization's future plans and emerging technologies.

Our dynamic internship experience blends hands‑on learning, enriching community‑building and professional development events, and collaboration with industry experts.

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, so we encourage you to apply early. Please clearly state your availability in your resume (Start date, End date).

Responsibilities

• Support the design, implementation, testing, and iteration of Search features, services, or tools under the guidance of engineers and mentors.
• Work with large-scale data, logs, metrics, or experiments to understand user search behavior and improve product or system quality.
• Collaborate with engineering, product, data science, and machine learning partners to define requirements and deliver project milestones.
• Write clear, maintainable code and documentation for assigned workstreams.
• Communicate progress, risks, and learnings with mentors and stakeholders throughout the internship.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications

• Must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time work.
• Currently pursuing a PhD in Software Development, Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
• Proficient coding skills and strong algorithm & data structure basis.
• Effective communication and teamwork skills.
• Experience in one or more of the following areas: NLP, Ranking, Ads, search engine, recommender system, distributed system, and machine learning.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with search, recommendation, machine learning, information retrieval, natural language processing, ranking, ads, content understanding, or data mining projects.
• Familiarity with databases, distributed systems, data pipelines, experimentation, or large-scale backend services.
• Experience using data to investigate product, user, or system problems.
• Ability to communicate technical ideas clearly and collaborate with cross‑functional partners.
• Interest in improving search experiences for large-scale consumer products.

Job Information

【For Pay Transparency】Compensation Description (Hourly) - Campus Intern

The hourly rate range for this position in the selected city is $60- $60.

Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Interns have day one access to health insurance, life insurance, wellbeing benefits and more. Interns also receive 10 paid holidays per year and paid sick time (56 hours if hired in first half of year, 40 if hired in second half of year). Interns who are not working 100% remote may also be eligible for housing allowance.

The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.

For Los Angeles County (unincorporated) Candidates:

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment:

• Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues;
• Appropriately handling and managing confidential information including proprietary and trade secret information and access to information technology systems; and
• Exercising sound judgment.

About TikTok

TikTok is the leading destination for short‑form mobile video. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. TikTok's global headquarters are in Los Angeles and Singapore, and we also have offices in New York City, London, Dublin, Paris, Berlin, Dubai, Jakarta, Seoul, and Tokyo.

Why Join Us

Inspiring creativity is at the core of TikTok'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. Join us.

Diversity & Inclusion

TikTok is committed to creating an inclusive space where employees are valued for their skills, experiences, and unique perspectives. Our platform connects people from across the globe and so does our workplace. At TikTok, our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy. To achieve that goal, we are committed to celebrating our diverse voices and to creating an environment that reflects the many communities we reach. We are passionate about this and hope you are too.

TikTok Accommodation

TikTok is committed to providing reasonable accommodations in our recruitment processes for candidates with disabilities, pregnancy, sincerely held religious beliefs or other reasons protected by applicable laws. If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation, please reach out to us at https://tinyurl.com/RA-request