Senior Software Engineer

Elastic, the Search AI Company, enables everyone to find answers in real time using all their data at scale. The Elastic Search AI Platform, used by more than 50% of the Fortune 500, brings together search and AI. Elastic's cloud-based solutions for search, security, and observability help organizations deliver on the promise of AI.

We're looking for a Senior Software Engineer to join the Elasticsearch - Search Relevance team. This globally-distributed team focuses on delivering a robust and feature-rich search experience, including contributing to Lucene. As a technical leader, you will contribute to the technical direction and vision for search capabilities, including design and implementation of new search features, enhancements, and bug fixes.

• Lead initiatives within Elasticsearch to produce an industry-leading search engine offering, supplying speed and relevance.
• Contribute to Elasticsearch full time, building new search features and fixing bugs, making code easier to understand.
• Invent or implement new algorithms or data structures; sometimes get close to the operating system and hardware.
• Work with a globally distributed team focused on vector search capabilities.
• Be an expert on Elasticsearch search relevance, identifying and driving improvements.
• Work with community members on issues and pull requests, triaging and handling them.
• Write idiomatic modern Java — Elasticsearch is 99.8% Java.

• Professional experience with search or vector databases, using HNSW, IVF, or other relevant algorithms and libraries on search platforms at scale.
• Solid skills in core Java, conversant in the standard library of data structures, concurrency constructs, and lambdas.
• High level of autonomy, able to take on projects from beginning to end, including technical design and collaboration.
• Comfortable developing collaboratively, giving and receiving feedback on code, approaches, and APIs.
• Experience with data storage technologies like Elasticsearch, Solr, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, or Cassandra.
• Proven track record of using AI to accelerate development, debug complex systems, and optimize code.
• Ability to collaborate across functions and teams, transitioning between projects and codebases.
• Work autonomously in a distributed team with asynchronous, direct, transparent communication.

• Built things with Elasticsearch before.
• Worked with open source projects and familiar with source control workflows and continuous integration.
• Experience with data storage technology.
• Experience designing, leading, and owning cross-functional initiatives.

Compensation is in the form of base salary; no variable component. The typical starting salary range for this role is €61,100—€96,600 EUR.

• Competitive pay based on the work you do, not previous salary.
• Health coverage for you and your family in many locations.
• Flexible locations and schedules for many roles.
• Generous vacation days each year.
• Match up to $2000 (or local currency equivalent) for financial donations and service.
• Up to 40 hours each year for volunteer projects.
• Minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave.

Elastic is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome individuals with disabilities; to request accommodation, email candidate_accessibility@elastic.co. Applicants have rights under Federal Employment Laws. This role may be subject to U.S. export controls for individuals in sanctioned countries.