Overview
On Site
USD 45.00 - 60.00 per hour
Full Time
Skills
Sales
AIM
SAP BASIS
PASS
Screening
Electronic Commerce
High Availability
Neural Network
Real-time
Optimization
Distributed Computing
Innovation
Research
Cloud Computing
Artificial Intelligence
Fusion
Collaboration
Machine Learning (ML)
Art
Mentorship
Computer Engineering
Software Development
Java
Python
C++
Computer Science
Data Structure
Algorithms
Systems Design
Employment Authorization
Search Engines
Apache Lucene
Elasticsearch
Storage
Redis
Big Data
Apache Flink
Apache Spark
Apache Kafka
Problem Solving
Conflict Resolution
Software Engineering
Open Source
Information Retrieval
Okapi BM25
Learning To Rank
Health Insurance
Life Insurance
Management
Information Technology
Video
LOS
Recruiting
Job Details
Responsibilities
About the Team: Search is no longer just a feature-it is the defining battleground that will determine whether TikTok Shop becomes the first truly global e-commerce super-app. Our Search platform is the core engine behind the "shelf-field" (product card) strategy, and the key to competing head-to-head in a global market worth over $10 trillion. Search will propel TikTok Shop from tens of billions to hundreds of billions in annual GMV by activating real shopping intent, unlocking zero-sales products, and ensuring every item becomes instantly discoverable the moment a user types or taps. We innovate where extreme performance, massive global scale, and uncompromising consistency meet. We are looking for talented individuals to join us for an internship in 2026. Internships at TikTok aim to offer students industry exposure and hands-on experience. Turn your ambitions into reality as your inspiration brings infinite opportunities at TikTok. Internships at TikTok aim to provide students with hands-on experience in developing fundamental skills and exploring potential career paths. A vibrant blend of social events and enriching development workshops will be available for you to explore. Here, you will utilize your knowledge in real-world scenarios while laying a strong foundation for personal and professional growth. It runs for 12 weeks. Candidates can apply to a maximum of two positions and will be considered for jobs in the order you apply. The application limit is applicable to TikTok and its affiliates' jobs globally. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. We encourage you to apply as early as possible. Please state your availability clearly in your resume (Start date, End date). Summer Start Dates: - May 11th, 2026 - May 18th, 2026 - May 26th, 2026 - June 8th, 2026 - June 22nd, 2026 We will prioritize candidates who are able to commit to these start dates. Please state your availability clearly in your resume (Start date, End date). Candidates who pass resume screening will be invited to participate in TikTok's technical online assessment. Responsibilities: During this internship, you will join the E-Commerce Engineering team to tackle challenges in distributed systems and information retrieval. You will: - Core Architecture: Design and develop high-performance, low-latency, and high-availability online search services. Optimize core components including the inverted index, vector retrieval (ANN/HNSW), and query understanding. - Data Pipelines: Build highly scalable and fault-tolerant data pipelines using Flink, Kafka, and Spark to ensure product changes (price, stock, and new listings) are reflected in search results in near real-time. - System Optimization: Drive latency and throughput optimizations for services handling hundreds of thousands of QPS. Troubleshoot complex distributed system issues to ensure 99.99% availability. - Innovation: Participate in the research and implementation of next-generation search infrastructure, focusing on storage decoupling, cloud-native architecture, AI Search, and multi-modal fusion. - Collaboration: Work with your mentor and ML engineers to productionize state-of-the-art models and build globalized large-scale recommendation systems. Key Perks: - Real Impact: Ship production code that affects hundreds of millions of users and billions in GMV. - Mentorship: 1:1 guidance from engineers who built TikTok's core search & recommendation systems. - Events: A vibrant blend of social events, speaker series, and hackathons. - Return Offer: High full-time return offer rate for top performers.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications: - Currently pursuing a Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Development, or a related technical discipline. - Must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time work period during Summer 2026. - Solid programming proficiency in at least one general-purpose language: C++, Go, Java, or Python (C++/Go is heavily preferred for Infra roles). - Strong foundation in computer science, specifically data structures, algorithms, and system design. - Must obtain work authorization in the country of employment at the time of hire and maintain ongoing work authorization during employment. Preferred Qualifications: - Graduating December 2026 onwards with the intent to return to the degree program after the completion of the internship. - Distributed Systems: Experience with search engines (e.g., Lucene, Elasticsearch, Vespa), distributed storage (RocksDB, Redis), or big data frameworks (Flink, Spark, Kafka). - Problem Solving: Demonstrated software engineering experience from previous internships, open-source contributions, or advanced programming (e.g., ACM-ICPC). - Domain Knowledge: Familiarity with information retrieval concepts (BM25, learning-to-rank) or vector similarity search (FAISS, HNSW).
Job Information
[For Pay Transparency]Compensation Description (Hourly) - Campus Intern
The hourly rate range for this position in the selected city is $45- $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:
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.
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
About the Team: Search is no longer just a feature-it is the defining battleground that will determine whether TikTok Shop becomes the first truly global e-commerce super-app. Our Search platform is the core engine behind the "shelf-field" (product card) strategy, and the key to competing head-to-head in a global market worth over $10 trillion. Search will propel TikTok Shop from tens of billions to hundreds of billions in annual GMV by activating real shopping intent, unlocking zero-sales products, and ensuring every item becomes instantly discoverable the moment a user types or taps. We innovate where extreme performance, massive global scale, and uncompromising consistency meet. We are looking for talented individuals to join us for an internship in 2026. Internships at TikTok aim to offer students industry exposure and hands-on experience. Turn your ambitions into reality as your inspiration brings infinite opportunities at TikTok. Internships at TikTok aim to provide students with hands-on experience in developing fundamental skills and exploring potential career paths. A vibrant blend of social events and enriching development workshops will be available for you to explore. Here, you will utilize your knowledge in real-world scenarios while laying a strong foundation for personal and professional growth. It runs for 12 weeks. Candidates can apply to a maximum of two positions and will be considered for jobs in the order you apply. The application limit is applicable to TikTok and its affiliates' jobs globally. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. We encourage you to apply as early as possible. Please state your availability clearly in your resume (Start date, End date). Summer Start Dates: - May 11th, 2026 - May 18th, 2026 - May 26th, 2026 - June 8th, 2026 - June 22nd, 2026 We will prioritize candidates who are able to commit to these start dates. Please state your availability clearly in your resume (Start date, End date). Candidates who pass resume screening will be invited to participate in TikTok's technical online assessment. Responsibilities: During this internship, you will join the E-Commerce Engineering team to tackle challenges in distributed systems and information retrieval. You will: - Core Architecture: Design and develop high-performance, low-latency, and high-availability online search services. Optimize core components including the inverted index, vector retrieval (ANN/HNSW), and query understanding. - Data Pipelines: Build highly scalable and fault-tolerant data pipelines using Flink, Kafka, and Spark to ensure product changes (price, stock, and new listings) are reflected in search results in near real-time. - System Optimization: Drive latency and throughput optimizations for services handling hundreds of thousands of QPS. Troubleshoot complex distributed system issues to ensure 99.99% availability. - Innovation: Participate in the research and implementation of next-generation search infrastructure, focusing on storage decoupling, cloud-native architecture, AI Search, and multi-modal fusion. - Collaboration: Work with your mentor and ML engineers to productionize state-of-the-art models and build globalized large-scale recommendation systems. Key Perks: - Real Impact: Ship production code that affects hundreds of millions of users and billions in GMV. - Mentorship: 1:1 guidance from engineers who built TikTok's core search & recommendation systems. - Events: A vibrant blend of social events, speaker series, and hackathons. - Return Offer: High full-time return offer rate for top performers.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications: - Currently pursuing a Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Software Development, or a related technical discipline. - Must be able to commit to a 12-week full-time work period during Summer 2026. - Solid programming proficiency in at least one general-purpose language: C++, Go, Java, or Python (C++/Go is heavily preferred for Infra roles). - Strong foundation in computer science, specifically data structures, algorithms, and system design. - Must obtain work authorization in the country of employment at the time of hire and maintain ongoing work authorization during employment. Preferred Qualifications: - Graduating December 2026 onwards with the intent to return to the degree program after the completion of the internship. - Distributed Systems: Experience with search engines (e.g., Lucene, Elasticsearch, Vespa), distributed storage (RocksDB, Redis), or big data frameworks (Flink, Spark, Kafka). - Problem Solving: Demonstrated software engineering experience from previous internships, open-source contributions, or advanced programming (e.g., ACM-ICPC). - Domain Knowledge: Familiarity with information retrieval concepts (BM25, learning-to-rank) or vector similarity search (FAISS, HNSW).
Job Information
[For Pay Transparency]Compensation Description (Hourly) - Campus Intern
The hourly rate range for this position in the selected city is $45- $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:
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.
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
Employers have access to artificial intelligence language tools (“AI”) that help generate and enhance job descriptions and AI may have been used to create this description. The position description has been reviewed for accuracy and Dice believes it to correctly reflect the job opportunity.