Senior AI Software Engineer - Code Intelligence & Quality Validation

TikTok Inc.; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 218,000 - 388,000; Full time

Job summary

TikTok Inc. is seeking an experienced software engineer to advance Code Graph and Quality Validation for large-scale client applications. You will design, implement, and optimize static and dynamic validation capabilities and collaborate across teams to improve reliability and developer productivity.

You will explore advanced techniques in code analysis, program slicing, anomaly detection, and AI-assisted workflows, contributing to robust, scalable systems used across our engineering org.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or above in Computer Science/Software Engineering/Artificial Intelligence or related field.
• 3+ years of professional software development experience.
• Proficiency in at least one mainstream language (Java/Kotlin/Go/Python/C++).
• Strong system design and software architecture skills with clear interfaces and dependencies.
• Hands-on experience with large-scale or complex engineering projects and production-ready solutions.
• Strong data structures/algorithms foundation and problem analysis.
• Ability to learn rapidly from technical docs, source code, and papers.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and optimize Code Graph capabilities including static and dynamic relationships.
• Contribute to architecture and technical design of core systems with a system-level view.
• Develop static validation capabilities based on the code graph and improve rule coverage.
• Build dynamic validation for production issue detection, reproduction, and root cause localization.
• Analyze complex production quality issues using code, traces, and runtime signals to extract patterns.
• Understand code organization, module dependencies, build pipelines, and runtime behavior in large-scale apps.
• Explore techniques in code analysis, program slicing, anomaly detection, LLMs/Agents, and related areas.
• Collaborate with client, backend, and infra teams to drive adoption in real-world workflows.

Skills

Java

Kotlin

Go

Python

C++

Education

Bachelor's degree or higher in Computer Science/Software Engineering/AI or related field

Tools

Android Framework

OpenTelemetry

eBPF

Code Intelligence

Job description

Responsibilities

The Agentic Ops US team focuses on two major areas: Code Graph and Quality Validation. The code graph serves as the data foundation for validation, encompassing static relationships (function calls, experiment/instrumentation dependencies) and dynamic execution paths (reconstructed from traces). Quality validation covers static rule checking (mining soft and logical constraints) and dynamic issue detection, reproduction, and fixing. We aim to improve code reliability and R&D efficiency through systematic, data-driven approaches.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and optimize Code Graph capabilities, including static relationship extraction, dynamic trace processing, execution path reconstruction, and graph data modeling.
• Contribute to the architecture and technical design of core systems, with a system-level view of module boundaries, dependencies, scalability, and maintainability, and drive technical solutions through implementation.
• Design and develop static validation capabilities based on the code graph, including mining and validating logical and soft constraints, while continuously improving rule accuracy and coverage.
• Build dynamic validation capabilities for production issue detection, reproduction, root cause localization, and assisted fixing, and develop reusable solutions for common problem patterns.
• Conduct in-depth analysis of complex production quality issues by leveraging code, traces, and other runtime signals, identify root causes, extract generalized patterns, and drive automated validation coverage.
• Develop a deep understanding of code organization, module dependencies, build pipelines, and runtime behavior in large-scale client applications, and explore how Code Intelligence can improve the understandability and quality of complex codebases.
• Explore and introduce techniques in code analysis, program slicing, anomaly detection, LLMs / Agents, and related areas, and apply them to real-world engineering problems.
• Collaborate closely with client, backend, and infrastructure teams to drive the adoption of Code Graph and Quality Validation capabilities in real-world development workflows.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or above in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, or a related field, with 3+ years of professional software development experience.
• Strong programming fundamentals and proficiency in at least one mainstream programming language, such as Java / Kotlin / Go / Python / C++, with solid coding practices and engineering skills.
• Strong system design and software architecture skills, with the ability to decompose complex systems, define clear module boundaries, interfaces, and dependencies, and make sound trade-offs across maintainability, scalability, reliability, and performance.
• Hands‑on experience with large-scale or complex engineering projects, with the ability to independently analyze problems, design technical solutions, implement core components, and drive solutions to production.
• Strong foundation in data structures and algorithms, with strong problem abstraction and analytical skills and the ability to quickly understand complex codebases and execution flows.
• Strong investigative mindset and curiosity about unfamiliar problems, with the ability to learn deeply from technical documentation, source code, papers, and other resources and translate insights into practical engineering solutions.
• Strong learning agility, with the ability to quickly ramp up on new technical domains, codebases, and complex systems.

Preferred Qualifications

• Android development experience is preferred, especially experience with Android Framework, application architecture, modularization, build systems, performance optimization, or large-scale Android applications.
• Experience with static analysis (e.g., AST, CFG, Call Graph, Data Flow / Pointer Analysis), program analysis, or compiler development.
• Experience with dynamic tracing, observability, or production diagnostics, such as eBPF, OpenTelemetry, or distributed tracing.
• Experience with Code Intelligence, Developer Infrastructure, automated testing, quality platforms, or Root Cause Analysis.
• Experience building large-scale distributed systems, graph processing systems, search/indexing infrastructure, or related platforms.
• Experience with LLMs, AI Coding Agents, Agentic Workflows, or AI for Software Engineering.
• Publications in academic conferences or journals related to code analysis, software engineering, or system reliability, or significant contributions to major open‑source projects.

Job Information

For Pay Transparency

Compensation Description (annually)

The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $218400 - $387600 annually.

Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate's qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units.

Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure).

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:

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