Software Engineer, Ads

About the Role

The ads system at TikTok operates on a massive scale and serves millions of advertisers, clients, and influencers across the world. The quality of the ads system depends heavily on the underlying infrastructure that handles massive data. The USDS Ads team empowers TikTok's global monetization by efficiently delivering ads and content on TikTok.

Responsibilities

• Ad-Serving System Architecture: Design and implement highly available ad-serving systems capable of handling large-scale traffic with low latency.
• Delivery & Monetization Strategy: Develop and optimize delivery strategies for various ad placements to maximize monetization efficiency.
• Core Ads Algorithms & Pipeline: Improve core algorithms and systems across ad recall, ranking, bidding, and traffic allocation.
• Data & Analytics Infrastructure: Leverage large-scale advertising data to enhance user- and ad-level monitoring systems, and build analytical and optimization tools for campaign performance.
• Cross-Functional Leadership: Communicate cross-functionally across various teams, organizations, and internal/external stakeholders to drive engineering efforts. Lead innovation efforts and bring in new ideas and technologies.

Requirements

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related technical disciplines.
• 3+ years of working experience and extensive knowledge of modern software tech stack, including large-scale backend systems and data pipelines.
• Strong Computer Science fundamentals (algorithms, data structures, software design), coding skills, and problem-solving skills.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Strong programming expertise, including debugging and performance optimization in general-purpose languages.
• Experience building or maintaining large-scale advertising infrastructure or similar high-throughput, low-latency systems.
• Excellent teamwork and communication skills, with a strong sense of ownership and the ability to move projects forward independently.
• Strong business and data intuition, passion for tackling complex problems, and proven ability in abstraction, project execution, and innovation.

About USDS TikTok

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.

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 an 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.

Pay

The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $136,800 - $359,720 annually. Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate’s qualifications, skills, competencies, and experience. 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

• Day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance.
• 401(k) savings plan with company match.
• Paid parental leave.
• Short-term and long-term disability coverage.
• Life insurance.
• Wellbeing benefits.
• 10 paid holidays per year.
• 10 paid sick days per year.
• 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure).

Schedule

Fully in-person schedule up to 5 days a week.